New for 2027 · Launching December 2026
Integrating a Palliative Approach: Essentials for Personal Support Workers, 3rd Edition
Everything PSWs need to give competent, compassionate palliative care. Everything teachers need to teach it well.
New: An online learning tool that is marked automatically. Save hours and hours of marking!
An updated and redesigned textbook, in print or online. Our brand-new online interactive tool. Ready-to-teach resources for every chapter. All built together, aligned with the palliative care competencies, and designed to be engaging and user-friendly.
Our promise
Delicious and digestible
For more than 20 years, our goal has been simple. We want palliative care education to be delicious and digestible.
Delicious means learners open the book and want to dive in.
Digestible means they read a page and think, “I can do that. I know how to do that.”
In other words, they are engaging and user-friendly.
And with the 3rd edition, we make the same promise to educators. The new online interactive tool is marked automatically, giving you feedback about your students and the competencies they are meeting.
The textbook
A fresh new look, with beautiful new illustrations throughout. Still seven chapters. Still built on real stories. Still written so learners can read it and use it.
- New: Stories across the life span, from children to older adults
- New: Stories that carry through the text and into the workbook and the online tool
- Learning outcomes in each chapter aligned with national and provincial competencies
- Respectful language that puts the person first
- Strategies for using PPS, ESAS-r, PAINAD and OPQRSTUVW in the PSW role
- New: Palliative care emergencies
- Deeper emotional and social care, including grief, hope, children and grief, and MAID
- Indigenous wellness, cultural safety and trauma-informed care woven throughout
- The last days and hours, including nearing death awareness and rituals
- Updated chapter on caring for yourself: Reflect, Refuel and Reset
- New: A glossary, plus current references and Canadian resources
Once again, the team of Life and Death Matters have created a resource that gets at both the heart and soul of caring for people who are seriously ill or at the end of life, and the details of the daily work of caregiving.
Betty Ferrell, PhD, RN, MA, CHPN, FAAN, FPCN
Professor and Director, Department of Nursing Research and Education, City of Hope; Director, End-of-Life Nursing Education Consortium (ELNEC)
First look
At the NACC conference, October 25-26
December 2026
The online tools open
January 2027
Ready for your classroom
You asked, we responded
The new resources
- Cover palliative care across the life span
- Clearly link content to competencies
- Decrease countless hours of marking
- Integrate strategies to increase reflection, knowledge and integration through activities
- Address the need for hybrid delivery: in person, online, in class or at home
- Meet the needs of many different learning styles
- Weave a trauma-informed approach and culturally safer care throughout the curriculum
- Enable educators to see how students are doing
More for educators
Built to save you time. Built to meet the standards.
Marked automatically. The new online tool replaces the workbook and marks the knowledge checks and scored activities for you. No stack of workbooks to take home. Hours and hours back in your week.
Built on the competencies. The learning outcomes in every chapter are aligned with the Canadian Interdisciplinary Palliative Care Competency Framework (2021) and the Ontario Personal Support Worker Program Standard (2022), including Vocational Learning Outcome 13.
Designed to help learners meet the competencies. In the new online interactive tool, learners play through scenarios so they can respond better in the workplace. Learning that builds competency and confidence, so learners are better prepared to care.
Activities for diverse learning styles, with support for hybrid learning. Activities for different learning styles, group activities that get people talking, and options for face-to-face, hybrid and online learning.
Resources for instructors. Lesson plans, PowerPoint decks, lecture notes and an exam bank for every chapter.
The complete resource suite
Everything you need, all in one place
One textbook at the centre, with a full set of resources around it. Every piece uses the same seven chapters, the same learning outcomes and the same stories.
What’s included
- Print workbook for learners
- New: Online interactive tool, with automated marking
- Reflection, knowledge and integration activities in every resource
- Instructor’s Guide with lesson plans
- PowerPoint deck for every chapter
- Confidential exam bank, for instructors only
A look inside the textbook!
Two pages from Chapter 1, showing the new design
The online tool replaces our print workbook
Schools with a learning management system use the new online tool. It replaces the workbook, and it is marked automatically. Schools without an LMS use the print workbook, or can talk with us about other options.
- Every learning outcome is covered in both the online tool and the print workbook
- One Instructor’s Guide and one PowerPoint deck for both routes
- Run activities before, during or after class
If you have students who are offline or unable to work digitally, we have a beautiful new print workbook that matches our other resources.
Online interactive tool
Branching scenarios where learners practise real conversations, with automated marking of knowledge checks. See the spotlight below.
Instructor’s Guide
Lesson plans and a timetable for every session, with teaching tips and a marking guide. Each activity links to its competency, textbook and workbook.
PowerPoint decks
A ready-to-use PowerPoint deck for every chapter, with the new illustrations, activity slides and speaker notes. Walk in, open it, teach.
Exam bank
A confidential exam bank with a final exam and a rewrite exam for each chapter. Practice quizzes in the online tool or workbook help learners feel ready.
Podcasts and videos
Stories and voices from the field that bring each chapter to life, refreshed for the 3rd edition.
Educator certification
Train-the-trainer certification for educators who teach the 3rd edition curriculum.
New · Opens December 2026
Meet the new online interactive tool!
Palliative care is not only about knowing the right answer. It is about what you say and do in the moment, and how it lands with the person in front of you.
Our new online tool lets learners practise those moments safely, again and again, before they meet them at the bedside.
The new interactive tool is marked automatically!
What the online tool does
The tool marks the knowledge checks, and one scored activity for each learning outcome. The scenarios are for practice, so learners can try, learn and try again.
What it does for you
- Marks automatically
- Builds a record of each learner’s competencies
- Runs in your learning management system
- Works face to face, hybrid or at a distance
What it does for your learners
- Scenarios with the people from the textbook
- Choices shape what happens next
- Feedback that explains why
- Private reflections
- Practice that is never marked
No access codes: learners sign in with their school email, and each learner has their own access. Purchase seats for each cohort, or for your whole year.
Across all the tools
Seven chapters
The same seven chapters run through the textbook, the online tool, the workbook and the teaching resources. Open a chapter to see what it covers.
What a palliative approach is, why it matters, and how it applies in every care setting.
The attitudes, values and self-awareness that make for compassionate, skilled care.
The tools that help PSWs observe, report and work with the team, so nothing important is missed.
Recognizing and responding to common symptoms, and knowing when and how to ask for help.
The emotional, social, spiritual and relational needs of the person and their family.
Comfort for the person and support for the family in this sweet and sacred time, at the time of death and after.
This work is meaningful, and it is also hard. This chapter is for you: self-care, compassion fatigue and resilience.
Praise for the 3rd edition
Integrating a Palliative Approach: Essentials for Personal Support Workers is more than a textbook—it is a guide to compassionate practice. Grounded in evidence, lived experience, and the principles of person-centred care, it empowers PSWs to build confidence, strengthen their clinical skills, and embrace the profound privilege of caring for others… When we support personal support workers to grow, we strengthen the quality, compassion, and dignity of care for people and communities across Canada.
Nancy Lefebre
Chief Operating Officer, Chief Nursing Executive & Senior Vice President, SE Health
…a thorough and up to date text that provides all a PSW needs to know (and much more) to provide exemplary care to people living with and dying from any advanced illness… It is particularly strong in incorporating cultural awareness, trauma-informed care and respect for Indigenous peoples.
Dr. Pippa Hawley
Professor of Medicine, Palliative Medicine Specialist, BC Cancer Agency
…is comprehensive without feeling overwhelming, offering tangible frameworks, visuals, and tools that PSWs can integrate into their everyday work… There is a genuine regard for PSWs as skilled care providers and for the people they support, making this a resource I would readily recommend to both students and those already working in the field.
Rebekah A. Gold, MA
Co-Founder and National Lead, Young Caregivers Collective of Canada
During my practicum I got to care for someone who was dying, and who died when I was with him. It was such an honour to be with him. I feel like the course really prepared me to do this work!
PSW student
After their practicum
Moving to the 3rd edition
Questions schools are asking
The online tools open in December 2026, and all 3rd edition resources will be ready for cohorts starting in January 2027.
No. Cohorts already underway can finish with the 2nd edition. Your school chooses the first cohort to start on the 3rd edition, and the 2nd edition stays available to you until then.
Yes. Print textbooks and workbooks are part of the 3rd edition. Use print, the online tool, or both.
Integrating a Palliative Approach is Module 9 of the NACC PSW program. The 3rd edition fits right in, and it adds to what your learners already do in that module.
Yes. Print resources can be ordered from our website. Our PACE program also offers continuing education designed for teams in long-term care.
Let’s plan your move to the 3rd edition
Our team is reaching out to every partner school to plan a transition that fits your schedule. Don’t want to wait? Contact us today.
Or email us at [email protected]
Life and Death Matters: transforming palliative care education, empowering competent and compassionate practice.
