Innovations in End-of-Life Care
an international journal of leaders in end-of-life care

Robin F. Kramer, MS, RN, PNP

Robin Kramer has been a Clinical Nurse Specialist/Pediatric Nurse Practitioner at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) Children’s Hospital in the Division of Pediatric Oncology since 1983. She coordinates pediatric outpatient services while also functioning in the clinical nurse specialist/nurse practitioner role. Ms. Kramer is often called upon to teach (formal and informal presentations) on the care of the child with cancer. Her most recent focus has been on pediatric palliative care, and she serves on an educational task force involved in planning interdisciplinary end-of-life care workshops for UCSF staff. She recently acted as a clinical collaborator with Betty Davies, PhD, RN, on a research proposal on the influence of cultural beliefs and practices on pediatric end-of-life care.

After many years of coordinating palliative care services for patients and their families, Ms. Kramer developed a growing commitment to improve services in this area. Six years ago, she initiated the development of the Family Bereavement Retreat Weekend for pediatric oncology and bone marrow transplant families whose children have died. That program is featured in this issue of Innovations. Ms. Kramer feels that participating in these weekends has been the most rewarding aspect of her professional career. After the most recent retreat in June, 2000, she approached several individuals in the pediatric administration with the idea of starting a multidisciplinary pediatric palliative care task force to improve end-of-life care at UCSF. As a result of this task force’s ongoing efforts, they hope to launch a pediatric palliative care consultative service in the fall of 2001.

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Kathy Carroll, RN, BSN

Ms. Carroll serves as bereavement services coordinator for both the infant loss program and the system-wide Bereavement Care Track at St. Vincent's Hospital and Health Systems in Indianapolis, Indiana.

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This archived issue:
Archive Issue Home | Editorial | Personal Reflections | Featured Innovation | Promising Practice | Book Review | Special Feature | Read More | Resources & Tools | On-line Discussion

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