PPF12 Increasing the confidence of foundation doctors in managing end of life care through a bespoke training day

<h3>Background</h3> As our population ages, the gap between life expectancy and morbidity-free survival continues to widen, providing a growing opportunity to initiate good quality Palliative Care. Yet, in acute hospital settings, this can be challenging. Worthing Hospital, on the South Coast, has a demographic skewed towards the elderly and those living with frailty. As such, our patient cohort has a high burden of palliative care needs. However, we identified that our Foundation Doctors lacked confidence and formal training when it came to managing end of life scenarios. So we created a training day, devised and delivered by Medical Trainees alongside Palliative Care Specialists, to cater for this need. <h3>Method</h3> The Training Day was delivered specifically to Foundation Year 1 Doctors, just prior to them becoming ‘Senior House Officers’, in order to prepare them as best as possible for this increase in responsibility. The day consisted of several immersive teaching modalities - case-based discussions, simulation scenarios and an interactive communication skills workshop. Three questionnaires were filled out by our candidates throughout the day, with standardised questions assessing their confidence in different aspects of managing end of life care. <h3>Results</h3> By the end of the Training Day our Foundation Doctors reported a 40% increase in confidence when managing end of life scenarios. Further to this, we demonstrated a stepwise increase in confidence across all topics assessed through the questionnaires, inclusive of but not limited to: ability to recognise the end of life, discussing end of life with relatives and suggesting palliation to seniors. <h3>Conclusion</h3> Foundation Doctors have little access to real world palliative care training, limiting their confidence and skillset when managing these complex situations. Medical Trainees are ideally placed to create and facilitate this training, as we can utilise our recent experiences to create bespoke and relevant teaching, in a supportive environment.