For Immediate Release
August 30, 2006
Contact: Kristen Baker, 800-854-3402
Hospice Foundation Of America’s 14th Annual
Living With Grief Teleconference Airs On March 22, 2007
1:30pm--4:00pm EDT
“LIVING WITH GRIEF: BEFORE AND AFTER THE DEATH”
Washington —National and international experts will take on the timeless topic of Living with Grief: Before and After the Death, during Hospice Foundation of America’s (HFA’s) annual teleconference that will air live via satellite and webcast on March 22, 2007.
The program is an opportunity for a wide range of hospice and other health care professionals, as well as clergy, social work and funeral professionals, to gain continuing education credits as they learn about subjects such as anticipatory mourning, cultural differences in grief expression, and approaches to grief therapy. Panelists will explore the most current theoretical perspectives on loss and grief as experienced by persons throughout a life-limiting illness and by survivors after the death. Additionally, the teleconference will focus on areas where understandings of grief have been challenged, and provide strategies to apply current knowledge into practice.
“Grief is a complex emotion that has the ability to either plague survivors for years, or become a force for positive change for people. Our mission during the 2007 teleconference is to bring the best thinking about current grief theories to one place,” said David Abrams, HFA’s president and CEO.
Frank Sesno, an Emmy-award winning journalist, special correspondent with CNN and a faculty member George Washington University’s School of Media and Public Affairs, will moderate the program, which features panelists:
Scott W. Bradley, MSW, CT, CFSP, a practicing psychotherapist as well as owner and managing partner of Bradley & Son Funeral Homes, LLC. Mr. Bradley has been a licensed funeral director in New Jersey for 19 years. Since receiving his master’s in social work from New York University in 1999, Mr. Bradley has been treating patients with a full range of diagnoses at various community mental health care centers in northern New Jersey. Mr. Bradley has continued his clinical training and attends the Academy of Clinical and Applied Psychoanalysis (ACAP) in West Orange, N.J. Mr. Bradley is certified in thanatology, and is a member of the National Association of Social Workers, Association for Death Education and Counseling, National Funeral Directors Association, New Jersey State Funeral Directors Association, Academy of Professional Funeral Service Practice, National Association for the Advancement of Psychoanalysis, and International Critical Incident Stress Foundation.
Kenneth J. Doka, PhD, MDiv, a Professor of Gerontology at the Graduate School of The College of New Rochelle. He is also a senior consultant to Hospice Foundation of America and helps direct the annual Living with Grief teleconference. Dr. Doka has written or edited 17 books, including HFA’s Living with Grief series, and has published 60 articles and book chapters. He is editor of Omega, a professional journal, and Journeys, HFA’s monthly bereavement newsletter. Dr. Doka was elected President of the Association for Death Education and Counseling (ADEC) in 1993, and in 1998, ADEC presented him with an Award for Outstanding Contributions in the Field of Death Education. He was elected to the Board of the International Work Group on Dying, Death and Bereavement in 1995, and served as chair from 1997 to 1999. His alma mater, Concordia College, presented him with its first Distinguished Alumnus Award. In 2006, Dr. Doka was recognized as a mental health counselor under New York State’s first licensure of counselors. Dr. Doka is an ordained Lutheran minister.
Lorraine Hedtke, MSW, ACSW, LCSW, specializes in working with people who are dying and with families after a loved one has died. She is employed by VITAS Innovative Hospice Care as a Bereavement Services Manager for the Inland Empire in California. She regularly teaches nationally and internationally about death, dying and bereavement and narrative therapy. Her articles have appeared in numerous professional and trade publications and newspapers. She is the author, along with John Winslade, of the book, Re-membering Lives: Conversations with the dying and the bereaved (Baywood Publishing, 2004). Her recent children’s book, My grandmother is always with me, is co-authored with her 13 year old daughter, Addison. Ms. Hedtke’s work represents a departure from conventional ways in which death and grief are thought of. Her teaching and writing embodies innovative theory in practical applications about “re-membering conversations”. This relational way of thinking about grief affirms that stories can potentially transcend physical limitations as living points of strength, resource and love. Further information about her unique approach to death and grief can be found at www.rememberingpractices.com
Patricia Murphy, PhD, APN, FAAN, Clinical Ethicist at UMDNJ-University Hospital in Newark, New Jersey, and an Associate Professor in the New Jersey Medical School Department of Surgery. Dr. Murphy was a member of the New Jersey Bioethics Commission, the multidisciplinary body that developed the Advance Directive and Brain Death legislation in New Jersey. A past president of the New Jersey State Nurses Association, she has been a member of the Board of Directors of the American Nurses Association and Vice President of the American Nurses Credentialing Center. Dr. Murphy is board certified as a Grief Therapist and as a Clinical Specialist in Advanced Psychiatric Nursing. She has more than 50 publications in the area of ethics and end-of-life care and has been selected by the American Medical Association to teach its EPEC curriculum on End-of-Life Care. In the fall of 2006, she will be a faculty member for the ELNEC program on End-of-Life Care in ICU. For more than 30 years Dr. Murphy has worked with patients who are dying and families who are acutely grieving.
Robert A. Neimeyer, PhD, Professor and Director of Psychotherapy in the Department of Psychology at the University of Memphis, where he also maintains an active clinical practice. Dr. Neimeyer has published 20 books, including Meaning Reconstruction and the Experience of Loss, and serves as editor of the journal Death Studies. The author of nearly 300 articles and book chapters, and a frequent workshop presenter, he is currently working to advance a more adequate theory of grieving as a meaning-making process. Neimeyer served as President of the Association for Death Education and Counseling and as Chair of the International Work Group for Death, Dying, & Bereavement. In recognition of his scholarly contributions, he has been granted the Eminent Faculty Award by the University of Memphis, and was made a Fellow of the American Psychological Association.
Robert Washington, PhD, MDiv, a licensed clinical psychologist and minister. During his 32-year career, he has held various administrative positions in mental health, including Commissioner of Mental Health Services for the District of Columbia and Executive Director for the Community Mental Health Council Chicago, and William Wendt Center for Loss and Healing in Washington, DC. For the last 20 years, Dr. Washington has specialized in grief counseling, working with those who are ill, dying and/or bereaved, and training others to do likewise. As a result of this work, Dr. Washington developed a strong interest in the interface of psychology and spirituality. He retired from mental health administration to pursue a second career in ministry. An ordained minister in the United Church of Christ, Dr. Washington currently works as a chaplain in the Admissions Department of Montgomery Hospice in Maryland. In 2005, he retired as adjunct professor in the End-of-Life Care Program at George Washington University.
“The teleconference has always provided an extraordinary vehicle to reach a great range of professionals, who may not always have other opportunities for the best education in grief and bereavement brought to them. One strength of this upcoming program will be our ability to look comprehensively both at the work done around grief during life-limiting illness, as well as the grief issues that follow death,” Doka said.
Continuing education credits will be available for a wide range of professionals. For more information on hosting a teleconference site for your organization or community, or to find out about existing teleconference sites, contact HFA at 1-800-854-3402. Additional information is available at HFA’s website, www.hospicefoundation.org/teleconference
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