Archstone Foundation Awards $1,978,925 in Grants

Long Beach, CA, October 8, 2010 – The Board of Directors of the Archstone Foundation, a grantmaking foundation committed to preparing society for the growing needs of an aging population, announced the approval of sixteen grants, totaling $1,978,925. Grants were approved during the first quarter of fiscal year 2011.

Eleven of the sixteen grants awarded are a part of the Foundation’s End-of-Life Initiative. The first nine grants continue the Foundation’s investment to improve the quality of spiritual care in hospital-based palliative care programs. The goal of the Spiritual Care Demonstration Projects is to advance knowledge, develop leadership, and implement best practices for patients and families. The Spiritual Care Demonstration Projects build upon the Foundation’s pioneering work in this important domain of palliative care. The Foundation’s President and CEO, Joseph F. Prevratil, J.D., said “This work is meaningful – spirituality is the rediscovered frontier. Each person born will eventually die, and even though we are aware of this fate, it is still difficult for many to comprehend and easier to deny. To deal with this inevitability, more and more people are turning to spirituality.”

The following grants were awarded under the End-of-Life Initiative:

- Brentwood Biomedical Research Institute, Los Angeles, California ($200,000): A two-year grant to support Incorporating Spiritual Care into Palliative Care. The project’s primary goal is to improve spiritual care for veterans with advanced illness at the Veterans Administration Greater Los Angeles Healthcare System by developing, implementing, and continuously improving on a conceptually-driven spiritual assessment and treatment model.

- Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California ($200,000): A two-year grant to support the Spiritual Care Integration Project. The project will maximize the contributions of the chaplaincy and palliative care teams and enhance the spiritual care and well being of palliative care patients and their families.

- City of Hope National Medical Center, Duarte, California ($200,000): A two-year grant to support System-wide and Systematic Screening for Spiritual Suffering. The goal of the project is to change the culture of spiritual care at the City of Hope.

- Palomar Pomerado North County Health Development, Inc., Escondido, California ($200,000): A two-year grant to support Implementation of a Spiritual Care Model in the Medical Surgical Intensive Care Unit. The goal of the identify and treat spiritual distress the same as any other medical issue in the medical surgical intensive care unit.

- Scripps Health, San Diego, California ($200,000): A two-year grant to support the Spiritual Care Enhancement Project. The project’s goal is to improve spiritual care through increased staff support, staff education and training, implementation of screening and assessment processes, and treatment protocols.

- St. Johns Healthcare Foundation, Oxnard, California ($200,000): A two-year grant to support Integrating Spiritual Care into Palliative Care Services. The project will improve the experience of palliative care patients and families through the use of a full time, board-certified chaplain who is specialized in end-of-life care.

- Saint Joseph Hospital of Orange, Orange, California ($200,000): A two-year grant to support Living the Mission: Palliative & Spiritual Care. The project will improve the quality of spiritual care and integrate it into the palliative care program.

- University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California ($200,000): A two-year grant to support Improving the Quality of Spiritual Care. The project will develop a spiritual care model to improve spiritual care education, assessment and care management skills for trainees across all disciplines rotating through the UCLA Palliative Care Program.

- Keck School of Medicine, Los Angeles, California ($200,000): A two-year grant to support By Your Side, a spirituality demonstration project in a large public safety net hospital serving underserved populations in Los Angeles.

- American Bar Association on Law and Aging, Washington, District of Columbia ($57,500): A one-year grant to create and validate a Web-based universal health care power of attorney form that can be used in every state.

- American Hospital Association’s Health Research and Education Trust, Chicago, Illinois ($15,000): A one-year grant to support the 2011 Circle of Life Awards, an annual awards program that recognizes palliative care innovations in hospices, hospitals and long-term care facilities.

Awarded as part of the Foundation’s responsive grantmaking were the following:

- California Dental Association Foundation, Sacramento, California ($51,425): A one-year grant to support the Senior Oral Health Training in Long-Term Care Facilities project. The project will train dental hygienists, who will then train and mentor staff at nursing homes in Los Angeles County.

- Alzheimer’s Family Services Center, Huntington Beach, California ($10,000): A one-year grant to support the JumpStart Program. The program empowers individuals with early memory loss and their care partners to cope with everyday challenges through a combination of professional support, education and socialization.

- American Society on Aging, San Francisco, California ($15,000): A one-year grant to develop and hold a special half-day program on the Village Models at the 2011 Joint Meeting of the American Society on Aging and the National Council on the Aging to be held in San Francisco, California on April 26-30, 2011.

- Help of Ojai, Ojai, California ($15,000): A one-year grant to support the Senior Services Program. Supportive services will be provided to low-income seniors in the Ojai Valley community.

- Jewish Family Service of Palm Springs and Desert Area, Palm Springs, California ($15,000): A one-year grant to support the Solutions for Seniors Program. The program provides low-income seniors with case management services so they live independently in their own homes and delay institutionalization.

A complete list of Archstone Foundation grantees and additional information may be found at www.archstone.org.

Archstone Foundation is a private grantmaking organization whose mission is to contribute toward the preparation of society in meeting the needs of an aging population. Under the leadership of Joseph F. Prevratil, J.D., President and CEO, the Archstone Foundation has awarded more than $75 million in grants since it was established in 1986. The Foundation’s funding priorities include end-of-life issues, elder abuse and neglect, fall prevention, and responsive grantmaking to address emerging issues within the aging population.