On February 18–19, 2025, the African Palliative Care Association (APCA), the Global Institute of Psychosocial, Palliative and End-of-Life Care (GIPPEC) and the University of North Carolina Project Malawi hosted the virtual symposium on Psychosocial, Palliative and End-of-Life Care in Africa.

This two-day event brought together leading researchers, clinicians, and advocates from across Africa and the globe to explore critical themes in psychosocial, palliative and supportive care in Africa. Video recorded sessions and the proceedings report are available here.

Building on this Momentum

An in-person working session is scheduled during the 8th Annual International African Palliative Care Meeting on 24th September 2025 at 4:10 pm (Okavango suite) in Botswana. This session will provide a comprehensive overview of research from the February 2025 symposium, followed by selected presentations on emerging research priorities, proposals, and topics in Africa.

Expression of Interest

Attendees of this working session are invited to submit an abstract on an emerging research priority, proposal, or topic in palliative and supportive care in Africa. Successful applicants will be invited to give a 10-minute presentation. The seminar will provide feedback, generate new ideas, and prepare presenters to apply for competitive funding.

Applicants selected will also be eligible to apply to the Princess Margaret Global Cancer Program Seed Grant Funding Call, sponsored by the Princess Margaret Global Cancer Program in partnership with GIPPEC and APCA.

Priority Research Areas

• Pediatric Palliative and Supportive Care
• Psychosocial Oncology
• Dementia
• Advance Care Planning
• Grief and Bereavement
• Health System Planning
• Symptom Management
• Quality of Dying and Death

Submission Details

Abstracts of 500 words or less should be sent in a single document to gippec@uhn.ca by August 22, 2025. Please use the provided template and stay within the word limit.

Applicants invited to present will be notified by September 6, 2025.

“The world needs dreamers and the world needs doers. But above all, what the world needs most are dreamers that do.” — Sarah Ban Breathnach

The challenge of providing high quality palliative care and bereavement support to all people in Africa is huge.

To achieve this, we need to move beyond the status quo and think ‘outside of the box’ to come up with radical new ideas to achieve this pressing goal.

We are inviting you to submit your idea for an innovation: nothing is too radical! This is an opportunity for ‘blue-sky thinking’, so prior research or formal evaluation of an idea are not essential.

Submission Format

• What is the challenge you have identified? (600 Characters)
• What is your radical idea to address this challenge? (600 Characters)
• Why do you think your idea will be successful? (600 Characters)

What is Innovation?

As we have said, we take a broad view, but here are some helpful grounding of how we'll be thinking about it:

WHO defines innovation as "encompassing the novel creation, adoption or adaption of policies, practices, systems, technologies, services and delivery methods within care to improve the efficiency, effectiveness, quality, safety or affordability of the care available" — WHO, 2016. Source

Innovation is “the adoption of new and established technologies alike, the use of scaled organisational models, and data-driven care delivery” (p. 3) — Roland et al., Imperial College London, 2022.

We define innovation in palliative care as the development or application of new ideas, services, tools, or approaches that improve the quality, accessibility, delivery, equity, or effectiveness of care for individuals with serious illnesses and their families. This includes novel practices or adaptations that address existing challenges in unique, scalable, and sustainable ways.

Live Competition

Top scoring submissions will have the opportunity to present at the competition to be held during the 8th International African Palliative Care & Allied Services Conference 2025 in Gaborone, Botswana in September 2025.

This will be in the form of a rapid 5 minute presentation, followed by 5 minutes of questions from a judging panel and from audience members. Finalists are expected to attend the conference in-person (No additional funding to support participants attending is available).

Prize(s) will be awarded for the best idea(s), along with the opportunity for mentorship to support steps towards implementation of the idea. Additional commended submissions will also be shared in an innovation ideas report / compilation to be published in conjunction with the conference.

Launch Webinar

For more detailed guidance, please join us for the following event - also available to watch afterwards via the link below:

APCA Radical Innovation Competition LAUNCH WEBINAR
Friday 30th May 2025, 16.00 East Africa Time

• Introduction to the competition
• A brief overview of innovation theory
• Presentations of examples of previous radical ideas that have since become established in palliative care in Africa
• Opportunity for questions

Joining link here

Key Dates

• Submissions are open NOW: https://forms.gle/mV3xVx1tGdvHgoUCA
• Closing date: 11th July 2025
• Outcome notification: 31st July 2025

Within the global disparities in providing pediatric palliative care (PPC), Africa hosts more than half (51.8%) of children requiring palliative care worldwide. Integrating PPC for children in this region is a pressing need. This entails not only strengthening the clinical skills of healthcare professionals but also collaborative interprofessional initiatives in capacity-building and advocacy to ensure equitable development and opportunities to share experiences and knowledge.

The Interdisciplinary Pediatric Palliative Care (PPC) Workshop - Africa combines parallel arms of core training in PPC and strategic exercises to further PPC development in the region, thus translating the essential components of PPC integration into actions.

This workshop is organized by APCA, St. Jude Global Palliative Care, Stanford, ICPCN, and other collaborating partners. It will be held in Botswana on September 23, 2025. The event includes a one-day working group meeting with regional leaders in PPC and a one-day fundamentals in PPC course.

The leaders track brings together regional leaders in PPC for an action planning activity to prioritize and accelerate PPC integration in the region at the practice, policy, and research levels. The parallel training for clinicians will address core components in PPC provision. Through design thinking and knowledge sharing, participants will share experiences, initiate cooperative projects, and establish common action plans to create a positive and sustainable impact on palliative care for children with cancer in the region.

1. Connor S, Morris C, Jaramillo E, et al. Global atlas for palliative care. 2nd ed. World Hospice and Palliative Care Alliance; 2020. Accessed January 4, 2022. https://www.thewhpca.org/resources/global-atlas-on-end-of-life-care
2. World Health Organization. Assessing the Development of Palliative Care Worldwide: A Set of Actionable Indicators. Geneva: World Health Organization; 2021. Accessed November 21, 2024. https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789240033351

This initiative will support the journey of regional PPC change agents in co-designing concrete steps for transforming the picture of regional PPC needs in the region.

II. Purpose and General Learning Outcomes

Purpose

Promote the integration of pediatric palliative care in Africa through interdisciplinary collaboration, action planning, and training.

Learning Outcomes

Leaders Workshop participants will be able to:

• Identify priorities for advancing pediatric palliative care in the region.
• Promote interdisciplinary collaboration by collectively developing a regional action plan.
• Implement improvement initiatives in PPC at local, national, or regional levels.

Training Workshop participants will be able to:

• Demonstrate increased knowledge about PPC principles.
• Develop skills in communication, symptom management, and holistic care for clinical practice.

Agenda – Fundamentals of Pediatric Palliative Care

Timing	Session Title	Speakers
7:30 – 8:30	Check-in
8:30 – 9:30	Welcome and Introductions	Justin Baker
9:30 – 10:00	What is palliative care and why does it matter?	Eve Namisango
10:00 – 10:30	The Power of Interdisciplinary Teamwork in PPC	Barbara Sekyere
10:30 – 11:00	Break
11:00 – 11:30	Pain: Multimodal Analgesia	Tonia Onyeka
11:30 – 12:00	Non-Pain Symptoms: Approaches to Nausea/Vomiting and Beyond	Michelle Meiring
12:00 – 12:30	Management of Emotional and Behavioral Symptoms	Erin Das
12:30 – 13:00	Goals of Care Discussions and Ethical Decision-Making	Esther Nafula
13:00 – 14:00	Lunch Break
14:00 – 15:30	Communication Skills for Delivering Serious News with Compassion (Group Role Play)	Zipporah Ali
15:30 – 16:00	End-of-Life Care for Children with Cancer and Families	Alyssa Tilly
16:00 – 16:30	Break
16:30 – 17:00	Grief and Bereavement	Elizabeth Kabuthi
17:00 – 17:45	Resilience and Self-care in Health Care Professionals	Alex Daniel
17:45 – 18:30	Wrap Up and Celebration