Rita & Alex Hillman Foundation Expands Support for Serious Illness and End of Life Care Initiatives

NEW YORK, Sept. 14, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — The Rita & Alex Hillman Foundation (RAHF) is announcing eight new grants to support early stage, nursing-driven interventions that seek to radically improve the provision of palliative and end of life care.

The grants, part of the Hillman Serious Illness and End of Life Emergent Innovation (HSEI) Program, represent the ingenuity of nurses committed to addressing the needs of communities who have struggled against discrimination and indifference. These include Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC), the economically disadvantaged, LGBTQ people, people experiencing homelessness, low-income rural populations, and other groups that encounter obstacles to quality healthcare.

“The pandemic has made disparities in palliative and end-of-life care even more painfully clear,” said Rachael Watman, Vice President of Programs at the Rita & Alex Hillman Foundation. “Together with our partners at the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations, we are committed to addressing these gaps in care and advancing innovative ideas to serve marginalized populations.”

Philanthropic Partnership Drives Progress
Thanks to an innovative partnership between the Rita & Alex Hillman Foundation and the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations, the HSEI program has significantly increased the amount of funding available for new and emerging work.

“We are proud to join forces with the Rita & Alex Hillman Foundation on the high-impact work they are doing to support innovation in serious illness and end of life care,” said Michael Murray, President of the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations. “We hope this partnership will inspire other funders to consider ways they can work together.”

Grants Focus on Communication, Trust, and Breaking Down Barriers to Equitable Care
Factors including structural racism, geographic barriers, patient mistrust, provider discomfort, and racial and cultural marginalization are some of the problems that the Hillman Serious Illness and End of Life Emergent Innovation grantees are addressing through nursing-led initiatives.

The 2021 HSEI grant recipients are:

• ACCEPT-PC: A Socio-Culturally Sensitive, Community-Based Palliative Care Intervention for Black Patients with Metastatic Cancer
  The goal of this study is to develop a community-based, palliative care intervention to mitigate disparities in distress and pain in Black patients with metastatic cancer.
  Principal Investigator: Melissa Mazor, PhD, MS, RN, The Mount Sinai Hospital
• Black Churches and Access to Hospice and Palliative Care in Arkansas
  Leveraging the influence of trusted local institutions like churches and town councils, this intervention seeks to expand acceptance and understanding of hospice and palliative care among rural Black communities.
  Principal Investigator: Deanna May, RN, Arkansas Hospice, Inc.
• Early Palliative Care Intervention for American Indian and Rural Patients with Advanced Cancer
  Cancer burden among American Indians (AI) in South Dakota is profound and inequitable, with mortality rates 26.2% higher than Whites’. This intervention seeks to increase access to culturally congruent, early palliative care for American Indian and rural patients living with advanced cancer.
  Principal Investigator: Sarah Mollman, PhD, MSN, RN, South Dakota State University College of Nursing
• Innovating for ImPACT: Nurse-led Telehealth for Pediatric Palliative Care Patients
  This program will design, implement, and evaluate a nurse-led telehealth intervention that provides home-based, culturally congruent palliative care to diverse pediatric patients and caregivers.
  Principal Investigator: Jane Bragg, MSN, ARNP, MBA, PMHNP-BC, CPON, NEA-BC, Nicklaus Children’s Hospital, Pediatric Advanced Care Team
• Primary Palliative Care for Urban-Dwelling African Americans with Chronic Lung Disease
  This project will test a novel, nursing-driven and telehealth-enabled collaborative model of palliative care (PC), specifically designed to increase uptake and impact of PC among marginalized patients with advanced lung disease.
  Principal Investigator: Carrie Stricker, PhD, RN, ANP-BC, Thomas Jefferson University
• A Primary Palliative Care Model for Pediatric Cardiac Patients
  This nursing-driven model for young Latinx cardiac patients will enable intensive care unit nurses and their interprofessional colleagues to deliver culturally-informed primary palliative care as part of routine clinical services.
  Principal Investigator: Sarah Green, DNP, CPNP-AC, RN, Children’s Hospital Los Angeles (CHLA), Institute for Nursing and Interprofessional Research
• A Telehealth Guide for e-Empathy in Goals of Care Conversations for African American/Black Kidney Patients
  This project will establish a culturally tailored approach to help clinicians communicate empathy more effectively when working with Black patients with kidney disease in a virtual/telehealth environment.
  Principal Investigator: Adriana Glenn, PhD, MA, MN, RN, FNP-BC, George Washington University School of Nursing
• Using COVID Lessons to Increase Access to POLST in Rural Communities
  The goal of this program is to improve the provision of telehealth-based, advance care planning for resource-strapped rural communities hard hit by the COVID-19 pandemic.
  Principal Investigator: Amy Vandenbroucke, JD, National POLST (a program of Tides Center)

About the Rita & Alex Hillman Foundation
The Rita & Alex Hillman Foundation’s mission is to improve the lives of patients and their families through nursing-driven innovation. To this end, the foundation cultivates nurse leaders, supports nursing research, and disseminates new models of care that are critical to making the U.S. healthcare system more patient-centered, accessible, equitable, and affordable. The foundation’s goal is to leverage the power of nursing’s unique knowledge to ensure that the healthcare system can deliver the high-quality care patients need and deserve. For more information, please visit www.rahf.org.

About the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations
The Arthur Vining Davis Foundations were organized in 1952 and are supported by two trusts established by Mr. Arthur Vining Davis. The Foundations aim to bear witness to Mr. Davis’ successful corporate leadership and his ambitious philanthropic vision. Since their inception, the Foundations have given over 3,800 grants totaling more than $300 million to colleges and universities, hospitals, medical schools, and divinity schools. For more information, please visit www.avdf.org.

Media Contact
Takouhi Mosoian, the Rita & Alex Hillman Foundation ([email protected])