Improving Palliative Care Together

ImPaCT

Our mission

To improve care for people living with serious illnesses and their families. Our focus is on multi-cultural and multi-lingual populations. To achieve this, we work together with these communities to understand their experiences and create innovative solutions that better meet their needs.

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Current Research

Our research focuses on improving care for people with serious illnesses and their families, emphasizing multicultural and multilingual populations. Projects like ImPaCT-Dementia and ImPaCT-Cancer explore innovative ways to enhance care experiences for communities with primary languages such as Mandarin, Cantonese, Spanish, Vietnamese, and Somali. By collaborating with these communities, we aim to understand their unique needs and develop tailored solutions to ensure equitable and effective care.

ImPaCT Cancer

ImPaCT-Cancer focuses on enhancing palliative care for patients with cancer and their families who have a primary language of Somali, Spanish, or Vietnamese.
Our research aims to identify barriers to care, improve communication between patients, families, and providers, and develop culturally tailored solutions.

ImPaCT Dementia

ImPaCT-Dementia seeks to improve palliative care access for individuals with dementia and their caregivers who speak Chinese (Mandarin/Cantonese), Spanish, or Vietnamese.
Through research, community partnerships, and collaborative decision-making, we develop patient-centered strategies to enhance care and reduce disparities.

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Lived Experiences: The Heart of Our Research

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Palliative care focuses on the person, not just the disease, honoring their unique cultural characteristics. We were honest and transparent with this patient about her cancer and future, ensuring she understood. I’m proud to provide this kind of compassionate care.

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I think a lot of palliative care that I’ve seen, whether there’s conflict or not, they always acknowledge that it’s a difficult situation for everybody and that they’re sorry that this is happening and that they’re always reachable. Just wanting to make it known that they’re there for the patient, but they’re also there to support the family with whatever they might need. And here I think I’ve had the same experience.

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And also always remember, look at the humanity part, look at this person prior of the cancer who they were. And remember because people are refugee and immigrant, they had a life. They were somebody. They were like lawyers, financial, business owners and all of that. Don’t think about like, ‘oh this is an immigrant.’ That you have to also pay attention. And I would say, ‘just ask in one minute or maybe tell me about you a little bit, what you used to do.’ People love to share that. And when that human connection happens, the rest is easy.

Dr. Rashmi K Sharma

Meet the Team 🔗

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