With the success of running the CTC programmes, our partner AIIMS (Department of Onco-Anaesthesia and Palliative Medicine at the Dr BRA Institute Rotary Cancer Hospital, All India Institute of Medical Science) has been designated by the World Health Organization (WHO) as a WHO Collaborating Centre for Training and Education in Palliative Care (WHO CC IND-163). The centre will be headed by our country lead, Dr Sushma Bhatnagar.
Another milestone added to the CTC programme has been the publication of ‘Building palliative care capacity in cancer treatment centres: a participatory action research‘ paper with the Journal of BMC Palliative Care.
After a two year hiatus, the CTC 5 Foundation course was successfully conducted ‘live’ in August 2022. Including CTC 5, the programme has trained about 228 healthcare workers from 62 institutions to-date, more than half our goal of 100 institutions. The recent training was observed by the Joint Secretary from the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India and Dr Bhatnagar had been invited to present the CTC programme to the Ministry with the possibility rolling out the CTC training as a recognised programme in India.
Additional programmes were also put in place for the CTC cohort. There had been 10 sessions of a workshop on ‘How to conduct palliative care Research’ conducted online. Dr Eric Finkelstein, Director of Lien Collaborative for Palliative Care Centre, had also been invited to the CTC 5 programme to share the Quality of Death and Dying Index and possibly to explore more research partnerships with India.
The CTC 5 cohort are currently on track to begin their Clinical Attachment training in November 2022 at our partnering teaching hospitals AIIMS and KMC (Kasturba Medical College, Manipal).
The Lien Collaborative has also given out 30 bursaries for the 30th International Conference of the Indian Association of Palliative Care (IAPCON) in India to allow the Lien Collaborative participants and faculty to gain further exposure to the latest development in the palliative care landscape.
Written by Mr Giam Cheong Leong (APHN Executive Director)
This project is a Lien Collaborative for Palliative Care initiative to build capacity in developing countries in Asia. The Lien Collaborative for Palliative Care was co-developed by the Asia Pacific Hospice Palliative Care Network (APHN) and the Lien Foundation.