Lightways Hospice and Serious Illness Care to Help the Joliet Community Understand Advance Care Planning

Grant Project funded by National Institutes of Health (NIH)

Lightways Hospice and Serious Illness Care will join a nationwide project and host a community game event at Ascension Saint Joseph Hospital Wallin Conference Center from 5:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m., Monday, June 24 to engage communities in important conversations about medical decision making. The event, featuring the conversation game Hello, will provide information about how to prepare for future decisions about serious and critical health issues. Complimentary dinner and refreshments will be provided.

“This game will help you prepare for situations you may not have considered before,” Kathy Peterson, Senior Director of Marketing and Business Development. “It makes conversations like these much more fun and meaningful.”

The advance care planning topic can be difficult, but it is a necessary one to discuss. The community game day event will bring people together for an enjoyable discussion about living well and quality end-of-life care. Participants will receive information about medical decision-making and an advance directive that they may choose to complete. This event is a first step to advance care planning, and every participant will leave prepared to continue the conversation and take important steps to ensure their end-of-life care goals are known.

The Hello events are part of a large, NIH-funded research study led by Lauren Jodi Van Scoy, M.D. at Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, through her research program, Project Talk. Hospice Foundation of America and the University of Kentucky are partners on the project. Participants who opt-in to participate can receive up to $90 in gift cards for their time.

Learning how best to engage communities in activities such as these is crucial to improving access to high quality of care later in life. Lightways Hospice and Serious Illness Care will help the Joliet community have conversations like these more often and more easily.

Register for the event online at lightways.org//project-talk-hello/ or email Kathy Peterson at kpeterson@lightways.com for more information.