Award-winning palliative care course for health care professionals.
LEAP Core is an interprofessional course that focuses on the essential competencies to provide a palliative care approach. LEAP Core is taught by local experts who are experienced palliative care clinicians and educators.
Delivery Modes
LEAP Core can be delivered online or in-person.
Who is it for?
LEAP Core is ideal for any health care professional (e.g. physician, nurse, pharmacist, social worker) whose primary focus of work is not palliative care but who provides care for patients with life-threatening and progressive life-limiting illnesses.
LEAP Core promotes teamwork, supports interprofessional collaboration, and fosters connections among providers in different agencies who work together (e.g. community-based family physicians, home care nurses, community pharmacists).
Course Features
- Interprofessional approach
- Built by Canadian palliative care experts
- Learners receive a LEAP certificate of completion and an electronic copy of the best-selling resource, the Pallium Palliative Pocketbook.
- Online
- 17 interactive, self-learning online modules completed at your own pace (approximately 8 hours of work).
- 6 hours of online webinars led by LEAP facilitators where learners will work through cases and discuss learnings from online modules.
- In-person
- Two days, 14 hours in total
- Face-to-face learning with group discussion and case studies
Accreditation
Online
This two-credit-per-hour Group Learning program meets the certification criteria of the College of Family Physicians of Canada and the Quebec College of Family Physicians and has been approved for 24 Mainpro+® credits under the condition that the ethical standards are met.
This event is an Accredited Group Learning Activity (Section 1) as defined by the Maintenance of Certification Program of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, and approved by the University of Ottawa’s Office of Continuing Professional Development. You may claim a maximum of 12 hours (credits are automatically calculated).
In-person
This two-credit-per-hour Group Learning program meets the certification criteria of the College of Family Physicians of Canada and the Quebec College of Family Physicians, a continuing professional development–accrediting organization recognized by the Collège des médecins du Québec, and has been approved for 28 Mainpro+® credits under the condition that the ethical standards are met.
Learning Outcomes
Upon completion of LEAP Core, learners should be able to:
- Describe the importance of self-awareness when providing palliative and end-of-life care.
- Identify patients who could benefit from a palliative care approach earlier in the illness trajectory.
- Assess and manage pain; delirium; gastrointestinal symptoms, hydration, and nutrition; and respiratory symptoms.
- Promote and undertake Advance Care Planning discussions.
- Develop plans to address spiritual, religious, or psychosocial needs.
- Initiate essential discussions related to palliative and end-of-life care in daily work.
- Prepare patients and families for last days and hours.
- Understand and apply the criteria to be met before initiating palliative sedation.
Topics Covered Include
- Being aware
- Taking ownership
- Decision-making
- Pain
- Gastrointestinal symptoms, hydration, and nutrition
- Advance care planning
- Delirium
- Respiratory symptoms
- Psychosocial and spiritual care
- Grief
- Essential conversations
- Last days and hours
- Request to hasten death
- Palliative sedation
- Resources and quality improvement