Guiding End-of-Life Care Planning with Cultural Contexts and Cognitive Impairment in Mind: Findings from Qualitative Interviews in South Korea and the US
Posted: 2/4/2023 (CSDE Seminar Series)
Student Lunch will take place following the seminar. Sign ups for 1-on-1 talks can be found here.
CSDE will be hosting Dr. Jung-Hwa Ha, Department of Social Welfare, Seoul National University for her talk on Guiding end-of-life care planning with cultural contexts and cognitive impairment in mind.
Advance care planning (ACP) is the process of making plans and decisions regarding end-of-life care (EOLC) when one still has the physical and cognitive capacity to do so. By engaging in ACP, family members and health care professionals can gain insight into their loved one’s or their patient’s preferences and goals concerning EOLC. In this presentation, I share a series of studies related to ACP in Korea and the US. The first study examined cultural differences in ACP and various strategies that social workers use to initiate conversations on ACP in South Korea and the US. We conducted qualitative interviews with twelve social workers and a thematic content analysis of the transcribed data. Our findings showed that different cultural norms and generational viewpoints surrounding death and health-related decision-making influenced how people prepared for EOLC. Whereas principles of self-determination and autonomy guided ACP practices in the US, decisions regarding EOLC were more often made in consultation with family members in Korean and Korean-American communities. Nevertheless, social workers in both countries identified relationship-building, empowerment, and individualized approaches as common strategies in initiating discussions on ACP. In the second study, we examined the benefits and challenges of ACP specifically for persons with dementia and identified the individual, societal, and cultural factors that needed to be considered for ACP to be helpful for this growing population. Finally, I share a coaching manual for dementia-specific ACP that our team has developed and discuss plans for future study to test its feasibility and effectiveness among older Koreans.
Date: 02/10/2023
Time: 12:30-1:30 PM PT
Location: 101 Hans Rosling Center or Online Here