Training in communication skills should be integrated with mandatory resuscitation training

How can we provide better care at the end of life? The recent US Institute of Medicine (IOM) report, Dying in America, is an excellent place to start.1 More than simply providing a comprehensive update on the dismal, though improving, quality of care at the end of life, it offers recommendations for five general areas of reform.

For clinicians, two major themes emerge: a need for better clinician-patient communication and a mechanism to foster these communication skills in different disciplines. One potential way to integrate and execute several of the IOM report’s recommendations in one would be to couple communication training with the mandatory advanced cardiovascular life support (ACLS) training that all clinicians regularly undertake.