March 2021 | Issue 2 | Page 8
A Highlight : Palliative Care at Baptist Memorial Hospital-Memphis by W . Greg Mullinax , MD , FAAFP
Tell us about your program at Baptist Memorial Hospital in Memphis . Baptist Memorial Hospital-Memphis is a 600 + bed quaternary hospital that serves a diverse urban community and supports a full array of specialties and procedures including heart transplant , stem cell transplant and neurosurgery . The hospital is the flagship hospital of the Baptist Memorial Health Care system and is one of Tennessee ' s highest volume hospitals . Our program , in its current form , originated in August of 2017 , growing from the prior work of two nurses who provided assistance in goals of care discussions , one of whom completed training to become the first NP on our team . We have grown rapidly from two physicians , a nurse practitioner and an advance practice nurse to a full scope service comprised of three physicians , four nurse practitioners , a dedicated chaplain , a licensed clinical social worker , and two rounding nurses staffing a service with a daily census ranging from 75-90 patients .
I have the privilege of serving as the first medical director and cofounding physician of this diverse and dynamic team . We are also currently involved in the training of palliative and geriatric fellows and family medicine residents . Baptist has a separate established hospice program with GIP inpatient services , a hospice residence , as well as home Hospice that works closely with our palliative medicine service .
What is the vision for your palliative care program at Baptist Memorial Hospital Memphis ? How do you envision your program growing in the next few years ? Baptist Memorial Hospital is a part of the Baptist Health Care network which includes 22 affiliate hospitals across 3 states . The vision for our palliative medicine service is to maintain the inpatient consult service while becoming a center of excellence for the Baptist network patterned after the Palliative Care Leadership Center model . In order to do this , we are working to become the palliative medicine training hub for the Baptist Health Care Network while also initiating outpatient co-located palliative medicine clinics and growing home-based palliative medicine . We want to provide a continuum of care for patients of all demographics diagnosed with a serious or life-limiting condition starting at the beginning with their diagnosis and supporting them through their entire disease process .
Please us about your experience with Forging the Future of Palliative Care 2020 Summit . Please tell us 1 or 2 main takeaways from the Summit that you might implement in your practice . I found the conference to be a good mix of evidenced-based approaches to palliative care practice coupled with honest descriptions of both successes in implementation as well as approaches that failed or missed the mark . With the explosion of telemedicine during the pandemic , our service was considering a deviation from our planned expansion to a detour that possibly utilized more remote technology . In light of this , the discussion by Drs . Rodney Tucker and Susan McCammon concerning the advantages and challenges of palliative telemedicine , highlighting the roughly 38 % or vulnerable palliative patients not able to utilize the technology was particularly helpful . Some of the barriers for patient technology use included dementia , physical disabilities , and limited access to the technology and their presentation helped us to set realistic goals and
Dr . Mullinax and his palliative care team . priorities concerning the trend in our community . ~ continued on page 9