International Programs

1. Palliative Care Training in Vietnam
2. PCEP in Germany

1. Palliative Care Training in Vietnam

International Programs at the Harvard Medical School Center for Palliative Care are directed by Dr. Eric L. Krakauer. Founder of the Vietnam-CDC-Harvard Medical School AIDS Partnership (VCHAP) and its Director from 2002 to 2006, Dr. Krakauer supervised the training of over 700 physicians and 50 nursing leaders in comprehensive HIV/AIDS care and treatment in Vietnam. He also provided training and technical assistance in palliative care to HIV/AIDS and cancer centers around the country.

Dr. Eric Krakauer assists staff to care for a patient at the Mai Hoa Center in Vietnam, a model palliative care center for homeless people with advanced AIDS.	The same patient after treatment at the Mai Hoa Center for tense ascites and tuberculosis. Now receiving antiretroviral therapy, he has regained his previous weight and strength and reconciled with his family. He remains at the Center as a staff member.

In 2005, he collaborated with Vietnam’s Ministry of Health on a rapid situation analysis of palliative care needs and services in Vietnam (link to website). He then assisted the Ministry to draft Vietnam’s first national “Guidelines on Palliative Care for Cancer and AIDS Patients,” issued in September 2006. He now is providing technical assistance to the Ministry for its review of laws and regulations governing availability of opioid analgesics.

Dr. Krakauer was a member of the Salzburg Group convened by the International Association of Hospice and Palliative Care to draft a List of Essential Medications for Palliative Care (link to website). He is a member of the International Advisory Collaboration on opioid policy of the Pain and Policy Studies Group at the University of Wisconsin Comprehensive Cancer Center, a WHO Collaborating Center (link to website).

Currently, clinician-educators at the Harvard Medical School Center for Palliative Care (HMS CPC) are collaborating with international colleagues to develop a complete, culturally appropriate and locally relevant curriculum in palliative care for Vietnam. In March 2007, four HMS CPC faculty members will travel to Vietnam to help teach Vietnam’s first national training courses in palliative care. An initial course will focus on developing Vietnam’s future palliative care faculty. A second course, taught collaboratively with the Vietnamese faculty-in-training, will train physician leaders from Vietnam’s foremost HIV/AIDS and cancer centers to both provide and teach palliative care.

The Center provides mentorship for medical students, residents, fellows and faculty members interested in palliative care in resource-limited settings.

A Harvard medical resident examines a patient at the Mai Hoa AIDS Center.	After teaching rounds at the Palliative Care and Pain Relief Service of the National Cancer Institute of Vietnam.

2. Program in Palliative Care Education and Practice (PCEP)

PCEP traveled to Germany!

With the assistance of several PCEP alumni from Germany, Bernadette Fittkau-Tonnesmann MD (class of 2005) and Gian D. Borasio MD (class of 2001), a week-long version of PCEP for medical students/faculty was offered in Germany. Five of our faculty, including Drs. Block and Billings, traveled there to teach from August 26 to September 2, 2006 and plan to return in 2008.
To view the 2008 flyer (in German), please click here.
To see the daily schedule, please click here.

If you would like to contact us, please send an e-mail to pallcare@partners.org or call Venus Watson at 617-582-7859.