The following is a summary of “An Educational Intervention to Enhance Palliative Care Training at HBCUs,” published in the MAY 2023 issue of Pain Management by Lyttle, et al.

Given the decreased access to specialty palliative care among Black patients and patients’ preference for race-concordant care, primary palliative care training is essential for Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) clinicians. For a study, researchers sought to describe the impact of a palliative care educational intervention at two HBCUs.

The study administered a palliative care educational intervention in family and internal medicine residency programs at Howard University College of Medicine and Morehouse School of Medicine. They sent pre- and post-intervention surveys to residents, assessing their attitudes toward palliative care education and their perceived competency in specific palliative care domains. The study analyzed the results using Chi-squared analysis.

Of the 191 residents who received the pre-intervention survey, 105 responded (response rate 55%), while 101 of the 240 residents who received the post-intervention survey responded (42%). Prior to the intervention, 50% of residents rated their overall preparedness in palliative care as a 7 or above (on a 0-10 Likert scale). However, after the educational intervention, 78% of residents rated their preparedness as 7 or above (P < .01). While post-intervention residents did not feel better prepared to treat symptoms, a higher percentage reported feeling well-prepared to deliver bad news (41% post-intervention vs. 23% pre-intervention) and conduct a family meeting (44% post-intervention vs. 27% pre-intervention) (P < .05). Pre-intervention, 14% of residents felt their overall palliative care education was very good or excellent, while post-intervention ratings increased to 30% (P < .01).

After receiving the palliative care educational intervention, residents’ confidence in their preparedness to provide palliative care, particularly in their communication skills, increased at two HBCUs.

Source: jpsmjournal.com/article/S0885-3924(23)00038-6/fulltext