We are delighted to welcome contributions from a range of speakers at our winter get-together.
Alison is a Senior Palliative Care Nurse who worked for nearly a decade as Director of Care at Ardgowan Hospice. Today, as a Queen’s Nurse, Alison is the founder, leader and guiding force of Compassionate Inverclyde, supported by Ardgowan Hospice and Inverclyde HSCP. She has combined her MSc in Palliative Care and an MBA with her community nursing experiences to inspire and coordinate an extraordinary set of community activities, supporting those most in need. It is a positive, pragmatic way of inspiring and mobilising people’s energy, better nature and willingness to help.
Singing songs charged with a sense of social responsibility in a career spanning over 25 years, Karan Casey has released 11albums as well as contributing to numerous other artists’ projects. She has toured extensively throughout the world, performing with her own band as well as diverse collaborations. Her most recent album Hieroglyphs That Tell the Tale was released by Vertical Records in 2018. Her song “Down in the Glen” was nominated for Best Original Folk Song at the RTE Folk Awards and she completed a PhD in 2019. Her new album is due for release in early 2023.
Prof Joachim Cohen is a social health scientist and a professor of the End-of-Life Care Research Group of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel. In the research group he is chairing a research program on public health and palliative care.
He graduated in 2001 as a Master in Sociology and in 2007 as a PhD in Social Health Sciences.
He is involved in several studies related to compassionate communities.
Prof. Cohen has published over 200 articles in international peer reviewed journals and co-edited the Oxford University Press book: “A public health perspective on end of life care”.
Louise D’Eer obtained a master’s degree in Criminological Sciences (2017) and a second master’s degree in Conflict & Development at the University of Ghent. In May 2019 she started working as a PhD student at the End-of-Life Care Research Group at Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB). She conducts research on the development and evaluation of neighbourhood civic engagement initiatives around serious illness, death and loss in two neighbourhoods in Flanders (Belgium).
Caroline Gibb has been the manager of The Truacanta Project since 2019. She has a background in community development and volunteer support and is an experienced trainer and facilitator. Areas she’s worked in previously include food poverty, health inequalities and equality and inclusion. Caroline is also involved in the development and delivery of the End of Life Aid Skills for Everyone (EASE) Course.
Clinically, Lynn specialised in Community Nursing and Palliative and End of Life Care (PEOLC). Lynn has a passion for education and joined the University of Dundee in 2012, where her roles have been varied. Bringing together her passion for PEOLC and education; Lynn has sought to create innovative and contemporary approaches to PEOLC education within pre-registration and post registration education.
Lynn is currently undertaking her doctoral thesis and plans to broadly explore ‘How do final year nursing students perceive their preparedness to deliver palliative and end of life care as newly qualified nurses?’
Mireille Hayden is a Health Psychologist. She is the founding director of Gentle Dusk, a socially-minded organisation that works with communities and the workforce to lift taboos around death, dying and bereavement and to raise awareness of the importance of end of life care planning.
Mireille has 20 years of experience in the Health Service and has worked on the development of training programmes for Hospice UK, NHS England and a variety of private and NHS organisations. She develops and delivers training programmes, workshops, services and events, helping professionals and the general public gain skills and confidence in initiating difficult conversations as well as the practicalities of planning for end of life care.
Mireille provides expert input into areas relating to death, dying and bereavement on TV, print and in scientific journals. Her appearances and publications include BBC News Worldwide, BBC ideas, Sky News, Arte, New Scientist Magazine, BBC Radio and local newspapers and magazines.
Susan is Community Development Coordinator at Strathcarron Hospice. She worked as a Community Clinical Nurse Specialist in Palliative Care for more than 20 years before beginning a journey of learning and discovery in 2013. Over the last 9 years Susan has led the development of a Compassionate Communities approach at Strathcarron. The team has grown to 11 non-clinical community workers who deliver a range of projects across Forth Valley and North Lanarkshire.
In 2019, as part of a Lottery funded project, Strathcarron Hospice became a Nurture Development Learning Site. With support and mentorship from Cormac Russell, Susan has led the team and the hospice towards an Asset Based Community Development model which recognises the unique contribution which communities and citizens have towards supporting people as they navigate ageing, illness, death and grieving.
Sally is a Senior Lecturer in Social Work at the University of Strathclyde. Before joining the University, she worked for 10 years as a professional social worker in both voluntary and statutory sectors, most latterly in palliative care. These experiences underpin her current teaching and research, which spans three broad fields; loss and bereavement; social work; and research skills. She has a particular interest in how we understand and support the resilience of communities to support death and bereavement experiences and, at the conference, will discuss her work with education communities to support teaching, learning and support across these areas.
Rebecca is interested in practical initiatives that increase opportunities, skills, knowledge and confidence around death, dying, loss and care within communities. She is involved in various related work including annual Demystifying Death weeks, the To Absent Friends Festival, the Scottish Bereavement Friendly Workplaces Toolkit, the Bereavement Charter Mark for Employers, the Truacanta Project and the End of Life Aid Skills for Everyone (EASE) public education course. She was one of the creators of the It Takes a Village Exhibition, a powerful and challenging series of portraits and personal stories exploring the idea that as people’s health deteriorates, care and support comes in many guises. She was lead author on A Road Less Lonely: moving forward with public health approaches to death, dying and bereavement in Scotland and recently co-authored with Mark Hazelwood Developing End of Life Literacy through Public Education, a chapter within the newly published Oxford Textbook of Public Health Palliative Care. She leads a module on Public Health Approaches to death, dying and bereavement as part of the University of Edinburgh's online Masters in Public Health Programme.
Bert Quintiens is a doctoral researcher at the End-of-Life Care Research Group of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel. He has a background in a nursing and holds a master of science in healthcare management and policy. His research revolves around a process and outcome evaluation of the initiation and development of two compassionate cities in Flanders, Belgium.
Dr Libby Sallnow is a palliative care consultant and academic. She is the first author of the Lancet Commission on the Value of Death (2022) and has helped lead and develop the fields of new public health approaches to end of life care, compassionate communities and social approaches to death, dying and loss over the past decade.
Jen Somerville worked in palliative care social work for nearly a decade before talking up a development role with Child Bereavement UK which has involved developing local and national networking opportunities to break down barriers, improve collaboration and ultimately access to bereavement support across Scotland. Jen is also an experienced trainer with Child Bereavement UK and delivers Bereavement Awareness sessions for professionals across Scotland. Jen holds a counselling diploma and works with bereaved people both at Child Bereavement UK and in private practice. Jen is also working towards completing a MA in Death, Religion and Culture. She has a husband and two children and loves drinking good quality coffee.
Jenny Watt is currently the Anticipatory Care Programme Manager for NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde. Through this role, she has lots of opportunities to talk about her favourite topics – death, dying and bereavement!
Not content with ensuring all her friends and family share their views and wishes with each other, Jenny hopes to get the whole of the West Coast to start the conversation about future planning and break the taboos which have caused death and dying to become words that are whispered in fear, rather than openings into a conversation that goes to the very heart of what it means to be human.
Jenny has spent the last 2 years training professionals to have better conversations with those they support in order to understand their motivations and what matters to them most. She has also been overseeing an ambitious programme across the Health Board to store and share this information with colleagues across multiple services, ensuring that care and treatment plans are tailored to the individual and meet their unique requirements to live life to the fullest.
Pushing Up The Daisies informs people of their options during the days between someone’s last breath and their burial or cremation. The charity operates an advice line and offers well-received, inspiring and informative education to nurses, end of life companions, celebrants and the general public. The Daisy Chain of volunteers around Scotland helps people consider all their options, including the option to keep someone in the privacy and comfort of home after their last breath.
Andy Jackson, Lapidus Scotland
Kate Clark, Pushing Up the Daisies
Jennifer Watt, Anticipatory Care Programme Manager, NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde
Hannah Gray, Senior Community Development Worker, Compassionate Communities, Strathcarron Hospice
Linda Sterry, Funeral Link Dundee
Marian Krawczyk, End of Life Studies Group and MSc Programme, University of Glasgow
Clare Carolan, Department of Nursing and Midwifery (Western Isles Campus), School of Health, Social Care and Wellbeing, University of Highlands and Islands
