Thank you for your ongoing support of the Oregon Hospice & Palliative Care Association. Your membership in the Association enables us to meet the challenges we face together—every year more than ever!

It continues to be a challenging time to be working in hospice and palliative care! Even during an ongoing pandemic, we remain committed to being an organization which grows and changes to offer more support and services to all our members. Here are a few of our recent activities and plans for the future:

• We have worked diligently during the PHE over this past 27 months to keep up with the ever-changing rules, waivers and guidance documents published by CMS, HHS, the CDC and the state. It has been our goal to focus on the details and then to share the information providers need to know in caring for patients and families during this Public Health Emergency.
• We participate regularly in advocacy efforts on behalf of providers. For example, we continue to advocate that some of the waivers granted during the PHE be made permanent, such as the use of telehealth for completion of face-to-face recertification visits, even beyond the already-granted 151-day extension once the PHE officially ends.
• We continue to offer regular networking opportunities to Regulatory/QAPI staff, Inpatient Hospice Directors/Managers, Hospice Volunteer Coordinators and Hospice Medical Directors. 
• “In This Together – Supporting Children and Families in Grief” went virtual as a result of COVID-19. We continue to explore how we can make this bereavement support program even more available in the future.
• We are offering complimentary webinars and networking meetings about regulatory topics of interest and provide recordings and slides which can be shared with staff at hospice programs.
• We worked with our lobbyist to offer support for bills favorable to hospice and palliative care services during the 2021 Legislative session. HB 2981 passed during the 2021 legislative session. This bill went into effect on January 1, 2022 and “requires the Oregon Health Authority to establish and administer program to provide, through coordinated care organizations, palliative care services, [and support provision of home- and community-based end of life care. Specifies eligibility, services and provider qualifications] as determined by interdisciplinary team, to patients in their choice of residences.” This summer and fall we will work collaboratively with others around the state and the Oregon Health Authority to draft the administrative rules so that CCO-covered patients can access interdisciplinary Palliative Care services in 2023.
• My participation on the following committees, advisory groups and panels and coalitions provides OHPCA with more opportunities to influence, network and gain useful information to share with our members and other organizations and agencies:
• NHPCO Regulatory and “Council of States” Steering Committees
• NGS Provider Outreach and Education Advisory Group
• Oregon Coalition for Living Well with Serious Illness
• Oregon Palliative Care and Quality of Life Advisory Panel
• Advance Directive Advisory Committee, simplifying and improving Oregon’s Advance Directive form.
• Oregon Psilocybin Services Advisory Board, to ensure that palliative care or hospice patients who want to utilize psilocybin as a part of their medication regime will have access to this medication.

I know I have commented that the past several years continued to bring a record number of regulatory changes in hospice. But nothing in the past could compare to the challenges hospice and palliative care programs have faced during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. When the pandemic is finally over, we know that we will continue to face the challenges of payment reform (including value-based purchasing models such as “VBID”), ever-increasing scrutiny by the MACs and other CMS “subcontractors”, continued change and expansion in quality reporting requirements and all of the “usual” challenges in providing care for dying Oregonians and their families. We must continue to address the challenges of providing hospice and palliative care during the ongoing Public Health Emergency, even as we anticipate the end PHE being declared sometime later this year.

Our goal remains to help you lead through the challenges. Our small size means that we can be both flexible and available to you, our members! It is our goal to:

• Be available to you when you need us, including for regulatory support and guidance.
• Be responsive to your requests.
• Keep you informed about our complex industry and the changes being proposed.
• Provide great education and networking opportunities.
• Advocate for your interests with external stakeholders who have the power to affect our work.

We continue to work on improving our website in an effort to better serve both the public and our member hospices. We want to continue to enhance it to be a dynamic resource for you. Meg McCauley, Director of Association Management, monitors our website daily. Please let her know if you have any suggestions or ideas for additional content or resources: mccauley@oregonhospice.org.

These are services and benefits you receive as a member of the Oregon Hospice & Palliative Care Association.  For these reasons, we invite you to be a Professional Provider member for 2022-2023. Thank you for your many contributions to the residents of our state.

Best Regards,

Barb Hansen, MA, RN, CEO

CURRENT ACCOUNT HOLDERS

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Additional Categories of Membership

• Associate Members (corporations, organizations, agencies, divisions, or businesses that have an interest in hospice and palliative care). Member benefits include discounted registration rates at Oregon Hospice & Palliative Care Association conferences and events, subscription to weekly Hospice News Network, inclusion on mailing list for educational opportunities, fundraising events, etc.
• Individual Members (individuals that have an interest in hospice and palliative care). Member benefits include discounted registration rates at Oregon Hospice & Palliative Care Association conferences and events, subscription to weekly Hospice News Network, inclusion on mailing list for educational opportunities, fundraising events, etc.

Individual Member

Individual Members are individuals that have an interest in hospice and palliative care.

Dues: $50 per Year