Foundation Program Sites

End-of-Life Care

Congratulations to our 2024 Bree Collaborative award winner for Best Practices in End-of-life Planning:

  • UW Medicine and UW Physicians
  • MultiCare
  • United Healthcare

(Adopted November 2014)

Patients often do not receive the care they and their families want at the end of life. This workgroup met from January to November 2014 to develop the following focus areas, increasing:

  • Awareness of advance care planning, advance directives, and POLST in Washington State
  • The number of people who participate in advance care planning in the clinical and community settings
  • The number of people who record their wishes and goals for end-of-life care using documents that: accurately represent their values; are easily understandable by all readers including family members, friends, and health care providers; and can be acted upon in the health care setting
  • The accessibility of completed advance directives and POLST for health systems and providers
  • The likelihood that a patient’s end-of-life care choices are honored

Supporting Materials

Letter from Health Care Authority Accepting End-of-Life Care Report and Recommendations
End-of-Life
Care Public Comment Summary
Workgroup Charter
The Washington State Medical Association’s Know Your Choices Campaign

Workgroup Members

Member Title Organization
Anna Ahrens Director of Patient and Family Support Services MultiCare Health System
J. Randall Curtis, MD, MPH Professor of Medicine, Director University of Washington Palliative Care Center of Excellence
Trudy James Chaplain Heartwork
Bree Johnston, MD Medical Director, Palliative Care PeaceHealth
Abbi Kaplan Principal Abbi Kaplan Company
Timothy Melhorn, MD Internist Yakima Valley Memorial Hospital (YVMH) and the Memorial Foundation
Joanne Roberts, MD Chief Medical Officer, NMR Administration Providence Everett Regional Medical Center
John Robinson, MD (Chair) Chief Medical Officer First Choice Health
Bruce Smith, MD (Vice Chair) Associate Medical Director, Strategy Deployment Group Health Physicians
Richard Stuart, DSW Clinical Professor Emeritus, Psychiatry University of Washington