Caregiving without Regrets: Helping Families in Our Care with Vicki Rackner is available for 90 days after enrollment.

Credit: 1 hour

CE/CME Offered: Nurse and Social Worker

This session was originally presented as a plenary session at NHPCO’s 6th National Conference on Volunteerism and Family Caregiving on December 6, 2009 in Orlando, Florida.

Family members providing care to seriously ill loved ones are often tormented with all kinds of regrets; things they did too much of, not enough of, too soon, too late, too harshly, too passively. They may be burned up, burned out, riddled with guilt and exhausted. How can we best serve the family members who are in our care; who not only need a helping hand but someone who can help them transform their feelings of guilt and regret? Dr. Vicki will help us see that the most effective caregivers are those that live fully in their own right. Dr. Vicki will guide and teach us how to be more effective helpers to the caregivers in our care, ensuring they understand that they are not alone, helping them to get and stay connected and providing them with the magical elixir of hope.

Learning Objectives:

• Discuss common regrets that caregivers experience;
• Identify ways that hospice and palliative care professionals and volunteers can help caregivers transform feelings of guilt and regret; and
• Discuss hospice and palliative professionals’ and volunteers’ roles of facilitating caregiving without regret.

Vicki Rackner, MD

Vicki Rackner, MD, the founder of The Caregiver Club, is a board-certified surgeon who left the operating room to help caregivers avoid burnout, manage dark feelings and speak up with the doctor. She tells stories based on her experiences as a physician, a patient and family caregiver. Dr. Vicki, as she has come to be known, is a nationally-noted expert in the doctor-patient relationship regularly quoted in publications like The Wall Street Journal, Reader’s Digest and USA Today, to name a few.

Dr. Vicki's practical tips about exactly what to do and say have changed the lives of thousands of caregivers. She tells the truth and inspires audiences with the hopeful message that we can and will meet any challenges that come our way. Her most recent book, Caregiving without Regrets: 3 Steps to Avoid Burnout and Manage Disappointment, Guilt and Anger, is just out.

Course Release Date: 2/06/2010

Course Expiration Date: 2/06/2013

Nurse:  NHPCO is accredited as a provider of continuing nursing education by the American Nurses Credentialing Center’s Commission on Accreditation.

NHPCO designates this enduring material for a maximum of 1.5 contact hours. Nurses should claim only the contact hours commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity. Accredited status by ANCC refers only to continuing nursing education and does not imply endorsement of any commercial product discussed in conjunction with this activity.

Social Worker: NHPCO is an approved provider of continuing education contact hours by the National Association of Social Workers (provider #886414158). This education activity is approved for 1 hours determined by the content, and social workers are awarded continuing education hours commensurate with the extent of their participation.

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