The Reclaiming the End of Life Initiative is a nonprofit, nonpartisan, New Hampshire-based project designed to make bold changes in the way we care for frail elderly, seriously ill persons of any age, and family caregivers.
The Reclaiming the End of Life Initiative was formed to use the New Hampshire presidential primaries and the national spotlight they command to engage candidates in a national conversation about how they plan to address the unmet needs of this large and increasing population of Americans in fragile conditions due to advanced age or illness, and the strain of the families who care for them.
The Initiative will not lobby or endorse any candidate or specific legislation, nor will it seek to influence the results of the election in any way. Instead it will provide candidates and their health-policy staffs with key research and realistic, achievable solutions endorsed by New Hampshire residents and voters to help them address this national crisis. At its heart the Reclaiming the End of Life Initiative is about requiring substantive discussions among our nation's leaders regarding the needs of our seriously ill or frail family members, friends, and neighbors. It is about finally bringing national attention, energy, and creativity to the task of caring well for the most vulnerable of people in America - a category every one of us will eventually enter.
In 2008 presidential candidates from both parties are traveling up and down the small state of New Hampshire and bringing with them a continual stream of national media and attention. During this presidential primary year every New Hampshire citizen will have the chance, if he or she wants it, to speak with every candidate, multiple times. As it happens, the population of New Hampshire is aging faster than America as a whole. By 2030 nearly 25 percent of the state's residents will be 65 and older. Recognizing the opportunity in these circumstances, the Reclaiming the End of Life Initiative was developed as a multipronged, nonpartisan strategy to catapult issues of frail elders, seriously ill people, and family caregivers to the national public policy discussions.
There are four phases to Initiative, each designed to build on the other in a coordinated effort to catapult end-of-life issues to national attention during the 2008 primaries and beyond to the November election. The process has begun!
I. Collecting the Voices of New Hampshire Citizens (Spring and Summer 2007)
New Hampshire's network of hospice, palliative care, long term care, cancer community and aging-service providers is engaged. To date, we have convened 7 of 8 Citizen Forums planned around the state. The results are invaluable. These Forums enable citizens to consider and decide what policy makers should do to improve care and support for frail elders, people who may be dying, and family caregivers. At the Forums, citizens consider recommendations from expert panels and advocacy groups and, using the latest participant-response technology, generate data on what they want presidential candidates to incorporate into their positions and policies. Through this process participants are lending their strong, clear voices to those whose voices have not been heard.
II. Making Our Voices Heard by Presidential Candidates (Fall 2007)
At its heart the Reclaiming Initiative is about requiring substantive discussions among our nation's leaders regarding the needs of our ill or frail family members, friends and neighbors. It is about finally bringing national attention, energy and creativity to the task of caring well for the most vulnerable of people in America; a category all of us will eventually enter.
A Report of the findings from the Citizen Forums will form the basis of specific questions for candidates, disseminated through our website (www.ReclaimTheEnd.org), in publications and in media briefings. More importantly, these questions will be directly posed to candidates by the hundreds (perhaps, soon, thousands) of people who have signed up to participate in the Initiative.
Thus, one fundamental component of the Reclaiming Initiative strategy is to make it impossible for candidates to avoid evidence-based questions that go to the root causes of suffering among ill and aged people, and their family caregivers. Candidates can expect to be asked what they will do as President to correct documented deficiencies in medical education, bureaucratic obstacles to proven treatments for chronic pain, or access to hospice care by people who are unwilling to stop legitimate treatments that may enable them to live longer.
But all that is barely half of the Reclaiming Initiative's strategy. At the same time that we are making it difficult to duck hard questions, we will be making it easier for them to develop thoughtful answers -- and carefully monitoring the degree to which each candidate engages these issues. Based on over twenty years of national research and authoritative reports from government agencies on aging and health care, and recommendations from citizen groups, including our own Citizen Forums, the Reclaiming Initiative will provide candidates and their health staff with briefings and background materials on the issues. The goal is to incite a serious debate among presidential candidates and in the press and between talk show pundits about how best to prepare for our aging population and the rapidly increasing millions of chronically ill people within our American communities.
III. Monitoring the Issues
The Reclaiming Initiative will keep the public informed by monitoring and reporting on its web and briefing materials the extent to which candidates' policy proposals and positions attend to care and support for frail elders, seriously ill people and family caregivers.
The Initiative will not lobby or endorse any candidate or specific legislation, nor will it seek to influence the result of the election in any way. But we fully intend to generate substantive discussion and debate. We will take full advantage of the national forum presented by the New Hampshire presidential primary to elevate end-of-life issues in the public debate.
IV. Sharing What We've Learned
Following the presidential primary, in spring 2008, we will prepare a publishable case study of the Reclaiming Initiative. We will offer our experience to advocacy groups and philanthropic organizations wishing to explore similar programs for raising issues of everyday significance to national attention.
We are succeeding in this plan. Our first 7 Citizen Forums have been great successes and already yielded valuable data. To date we have enrolled over 20 state and national organizations as sponsors and partners and over 500 individual participants. The Initiative website (www.ReclaimTheEnd.org) has lots of information and resources, and will continue to expand through the coming months. It is the place to watch for Forum Results and updates on the progress of the Initiative.
