Sienna Caspar and Sandra Woodhead Lyons welcome guests to presentation.
The Institute for Continuing Care Education and Research (ICCER) marked its fifth anniversary last week with presentations in both Calgary and Edmonton by Sienna Caspar. Currently a PhD candidate at UBC, Caspar spent over 15 years as a certified therapeutic recreation specialist in long-term care (LTC) facilities. Three years ago, she lived with her late husband in a palliative care unit while he faced stage 4 cancer and developed dementia. Caspar spoke about how the social organization of resident care influences the provision of person-centred care. Participants, including policy makers, researchers and educators, front-line workers and patients, both in person and via video and teleconference came to hear this very informed and informative presentation.
Caspar is a passionate advocate of empowering care providers to make decisions based on their experiences and training. "I saw first-hand how information exchange between care providers is critical to delivering individualized, responsive care to people who are no longer able to speak for themselves," she says. This experience led to her decision to focus on resident-care information exchange in LTC facilities.
Susan Slaughter is an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Nursing at the U of A and a member of the ICCER Steering Committee. "The ICCER audience is well positioned to translate research findings, such as Sienna's, into practice," says Dr. Slaughter. "No one said it would be easy, but the creativity, synergy and motivation that can emerge from partnerships - such as the partnerships in ICCER - can make it happen!"
ICCER is a collaborative endeavour between the University of Alberta, NorQuest College, Keyano College, Bow Valley College, CapitalCare, Excel Society, and Bethany Care Society. ICCER's partnership creates synergies that result in leading edge research and evidence, allowing for innovation and the implementation of best practices. "Person or resident-centred care is a very important concept for improving the lives of those in the continuing care sector. Sienna Caspar is also talking about the importance of leadership throughout an organization, encouraging and supporting the implementation of a resident-centred approach," says Sandra Woodhead Lyons, Executive Director of ICCER. "One of the things we learned through the Community Needs Driven Research Network (CNDRN) consultation process, is that a resident-centred approach is critical to addressing many of the community's priority issues - including mental health, education, system navigation and intercultural issues. "
ICCER's mission to enhance the quality of life for those served in the continuing care system by creating a continuum of learning and research, and by ensuring excellence in education for students.
For more information about ICCER and their work to date, please visit http://www.iccer.ca/about.html. You can also follow ICCER and get involved in the discussion on linkedin.