- The North Shore Bucket List Festival, Saturday, May 4, from 10 a.m. to 2: 15 p.m. at the Pinnacle Hotel at the Pier. Cost: $25 (includes breakfast and lunch). Info and registration: northshorehospice.ca.
THE organizers behind an upcoming educational event hope those who attend walk away with increased knowledge about how to make the most of life when it's at its most precious.
Representatives of the North Shore Hospice Society are presenting the inaugural North Shore Bucket List Festival, Saturday, May 4 at North Vancouver's Pinnacle Hotel at the Pier. While open to all, the event has been tailored to patients dealing with a life-limiting illness, and their family and friends.
The event takes its lead from a Bucket List Festival presented in previous years by Dr. Pippa Hawley, a palliative medicine specialist at B.C. Cancer Agency.
"That was a Vancouver Bucket List Festival and this is the first North Shore Bucket List Festival," say Eleanor Campbell, a society board member.
Hawley will be among the featured speakers on May 4. Her presentation is entitled Planning a Living Wake. Examples of other presentations include: The Unwell Traveller by travel consultants Sandy Odell and Sam Wilkinson; Making a Personal Memoir by Gaby Eirew of RecordMeNow.org and registered clinical counsellor Danielle Schroeder; Navigating the Health Care System, by North Shore palliative care physician Dr. Jennifer Walker; and the North Shore Hospice day program by Dr. Peter Edmonds, medical director of the North Shore Palliative and Supportive Care Program.
Campbell, who is a registered and home care nurse, will also give a presentation, along with fellow society board member and nurse Sally Jessiman, on the comforts of home.
As end of life can be a difficult topic for many people to discuss, the presentations have been designed to be upbeat.
"This event is a positive twist for individuals and families who are in a difficult situation. . . . It's how to make the most of the time that you have," she says.
