Communication Skills Workshops

Physicians and nurses in Internal Medicine, Intensive Care Units, Emergency Medicine and Geriatrics
 

Goals of the Course:  
To acquire practical communication skills for discussing end-of-life care with patients and their families, as well as with colleagues and professionals who deal with this sensitive issue.

Course Description:
For healthcare professionals, particularly those who care for the elderly, helping patients and their families cope with end-of-life situations calls for exceptional communication skills with the patients, families and medical staff. Many internists, including senior physicians and department heads, feel that there is a need to improve their skills for handling these situations.   

Participants in the course practice in a variety of scenarios related to decision-making in end-of-life situations, with actors playing elderly patients and family members. Communications specialists and the other participants observe the practice sessions from behind one-way windows, and the sessions are also videotaped for debriefing purposes. An in-depth debriefing is conducted at the end of each session, led by experienced evaluators and with the involvement of all the participants, using the recorded materials as a basis for discussion. The goal of the debriefing is to provide feedback to the physicians and help them understand how they can better communicate with patients and their families. 

The course was developed in collaboration between Prof. Amitai Ziv of MSR and senior physicians from Hadassah (Dr. Meir Frankel, Prof. Allen Rabinov and Prof. Mayer Brezis ), at the initiative of Dr. Yael Lahat, as part of her internship program in internal medicine at Assaf Harofeh Hospital, and with the support of the LILACH (Live and Die with Honor) Organization, and sponsorship by the Israeli Association of Internists and the Israeli Association of Geriatricians.