Presentation
Narrative Competence in Serious Illness Discussions
DescriptionThe skill of leading serious illness conversations (sometimes called “family meetings” or “goals of care conversations”) is most often taught using highly structured, often acronymic models that are easily standardized for use in multiple educational settings and levels of training. Despite increasingly robust education in this arena, studies in neurocritically ill patients and their surrogate decision-makers (SDMs) demonstrate difficulty achieving goal-concordant care persistent discordance in understanding of prognosis between the SDMs and medical team (e.g. Kiker et al, 2021). In this talk, I will address the importance of combining structured “acronymic” models of serious illness conversation with the concept of “narrative competence.” Narrative competence, first defined in 2001 by Dr. Rita Charon, is the ability to attend humanistically to the social, cultural, and personal context with which a patient or SDM approaches their illness. This talk will explore methods of assessing narrative competence in oneself and in learners. The talk will introduce attendees to techniques to improve their own narrative competence and integrate narrative techniques into serious illness conversations to facilitate more flexible, goal-concordant, and empathetic care.
Event Type
Breakout Session
TimeThursday, October 17th8:00am - 8:20am PDT
LocationHarbor Ballroom A
Clinical Practice
Basic/Neurocritical Care 101
Coma
General Critical Care
Hospitalist Practice
NCC Fellowship/Training
Intermediate
Advanced