The Importance of
Advance Care Planning
At every time of life, we want to be treated with respect and have our wishes honored.
This is especially true when we are very ill or dying. Often at this time, it is likely we cannot speak for ourselves to let others know what we want. Advance care planning is a process where you can think about and document your preferences for future medical care, should you have a serious illness or injury and become unable to speak for yourself.
Addressing Disparities
African Americans experience long-standing serious illness care disparities including a disproportionate burden of serious illness and lower rates of advance directive completion. Given these disparities, ACCA has undertaken multiple activities to expand, enhance, and improve advance care planning in the African American community. What we continue to learn in these efforts is that in order to make needed progress in advance care planning for faith‐based African American communities, a variety of approaches and recommendations are needed to target multiple perspectives across time.
With support from the Stupski Foundation, ACCA has developed our Advance Care Planning toolkit with tools designed for these multiple perspectives including the individual, congregation/faith leader, community, and clinician.
Scroll down this page to see some of the tools designed for everyone, including our Care Planning Workbook.
Advance Care Planning Tools
Videos
Learn about Hospice and Palliative Care, and hear from two of our Care Navigators, Rev. Jesse Land and Alexis Owens, as they tell their story about the importance of advance care planning.
What is Hospice?
What is Palliative Care?
ACCA Advance Care Planning Workbook
Originally developed in 2019 by the ACCA, specifically for the faith-based African American community. ACCA Leadership, Care Navigators and Pastors were all lead contributors to this effort.
We are so proud to be able to provide this important workbook to our program participants. Our Care Navigators are specially trained to walk participants through the 3 easy-to-follow steps of Think, Plan and Do. Care Navigators help guide participants in thinking through what is important to them, what makes their life meaningful and how they can document those wishes on the included forms. The workbook also features information on what treatments are available at the end-of-life, how to have discussions with family, friends, and their clinicians and how to select a health care agent.
As one of the Five Cornerstones of our Advanced Illness Care Program, Advance Care Planning is an integral part of our work with participants.
If you would like to receive an electronic version of this Workbook for download, fill out this form.