Completed Life Initiative Roundtable Death Café - Nov. 2022

The Roundtable Death Café is an event series created by the Completed Life Initiative.

Each Roundtable is a two-hour event that provides an open forum for panelists to deconstruct the stigma surrounding death and dying. For the first half of the event, our panelists will discuss how death cafés can work to destigmatize these conversations through local, small group connections; how these events can advance empathy and compassion towards grief and end-of-life suffering; and how individuals and organizations, on both a local and national scale, can further promote #deathpositivity. For the second half, our audience will be assigned into breakout rooms that will follow the traditional Death Café model of participant-led discussion. The second portion of the event is entirely confidential and private. Only the first half panel discussion will be recorded.

For our November session, we will be joined by two esteemed panelists:

• Corinne Alstrom-Sonne is a Black, queer, cisgender woman with disabilities, living and working in Toronto on the traditional territory of many nations including the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishnabeg, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee and the Wendat. She is a trained death doula and hospice volunteer, and hold a Bachelor of Social Work from Ryerson University. As a death doula, she provides dying people, their families (however they define that), and friends with spiritual, social, and emotional support. She works within a social work framework of “meeting the client where they are at.” Her website is www.deathcoachcorinne.com.
• Kathy Kastner has been bringing the patient ‘voice’ to healthcare education since 2000, when she pioneered patient-education television networks that broadcast in top teaching hospitals across North America. Currently her focus and passion is improving meaningful communication and shared decision-making in end of life conversations. Kathy has written a book, Death Kills, and her TEDtalk titled, "Exit Laughing." A keen supporter of Medical Assistance in Dying, which is legal in Canada, Kathy is a volunteer witness for the paperwork required to initiate a request for MAID. She is currently in her 6th year as patient advisor on the International Summit on Leadership Education for Physicians, and is a Patient Partner on a PCORI funded evaluation of Advance Care Planning in two different settings. Her website is www.bestendings.com.

*NOTE* Due to the participatory nature of this event, attendees will only be able to join via Cisco Webex on their computer. You will NOT be able to call-in to this event over the phone.