H eadlines
Palliative Continued from Page 1
themselves acting as friend,
confidante and family surro-
gate for their patients, cut off
from the people who would
normally fill those roles.

Though those who provide
palliative care always tend to
the emotional and psychosocial
needs of their patients, hospital-
ized patients have come to lean
much more heavily on their
doctors and nurses for those
purposes in the last eight months.

“In normal times, we’re here
to support the patient and the
family. We organize family
meetings where the whole
family can come in, and we can
go over options, and we facili-
tate discussions,” Siegel said.

“And now with COVID, in
the isolation, it feels like we’re
providing much more hands-
on, bedside care for the patient,
because we’re their only link to
the outside often.”
Distinct from hospice care,
palliative care is intended to
optimize the quality of life for
those living with life-threatening
illnesses. Beyond providing the
medical care needed to ensure
such a thing, palliative care
teams coordinate with a patient’s
other doctors, and provide
emotional support to patients
14 NOVEMBER 12, 2020
and their families. Those
teams frequently include social
workers, therapists, chaplains
and nutritionists, and that care
can be provided to patients at
home or at the hospital.

For Larry Kramer, 79, of
Center City, being a patient
of Siegel’s this past fall meant
more than COVID-specific
treatment. It meant having an
advocate, Kramer said, an asset
that he tried to provide himself
back in his days as a physician.

It meant that he had someone
to call his wife and daughter to
provide updates on his condi-
tion, and it also meant a steady
stream of Twizzlers and Swedish
Fish whenever Siegel came to
check on him. In low moments,
individually wrapped candies
can add up to more than the
sum of their parts.

“She was almost like clergy, a
nurse, a social worker,” Kramer
said. “And I was happy that she
came and saw me.”
Palliative care doctors,
Siegel said, are “trained experts
in communication,” which
has been a boon to their work
during the pandemic. Providing
emotional support and acting
as a go-between for patients and
their families comes naturally.

Eric Goodlev, a palliative
care physician at Einstein
Medical Center Montgomery,
Greg Garber is the director of patient support services
at Jefferson Health.
Courtesy of Jefferson Health
Dr. Mari Siegel said that her work as a palliative care
doctor gives her access to holy space.

 Courtesy of Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University
In normal times, we’re here to support the patient and the family.

We organize family meetings where the whole family can come in, and
we can go over options, and we facilitate discussions.”
DR. MARI SIEGEL
was drawn to the field in
part because of the work of
his wife, Lauren Goodlev, the
cantor at Beth David Reform
Congregation. Inspired by the
meaning and sense of purpose
that she drew from her work,
Goodlev decided to switch
from life as an academic hospi-
talist to his current profession.

Now, it’s the work to which
he feels called. A mentor of his
has described palliative care as
“medical care as a ministry.”
Though Goodlev doesn’t quite
sign on to that description, he
feels strongly that the work he
does is an expression of his
own Judaism. In the past eight
months, his patients have come
to depend on his humanity as
much as they have his skill.

At Jefferson Health, Greg
Garber, director of patient
support services, and Brooke
Worster, medical director
for supportive medicine and
cancer survivorship, are
JEWISH EXPONENT
adjusting to discussing life
and death matters with their
patients’ family members over
the phone, right as they’re
trying to help their patients
adjust to it, too.

They’re also trying to
make sure that inequalities in
the distribution of palliative
care aren’t exacerbated even
further — not every patient
or their family has access to
the technology needed for
virtual care, for example.

Worster hopes that this period
has underlined the necessity
of palliative care for hospitals
across the country.

“This is a needed resource,
and we need to look at the ways
in which we can financially
make it either reimbursable or
sustainable for all patients to
have access to it,” Worster said.

The changes are not so
drastic for everyone in pallia-
tive care.

At Children’s Hospital of
Pennsylvania, Dr. Miriam
Stewart works with the
pediatric advanced care team,
providing palliative care to
children. For one thing, the
incidence of COVID cases
among her patient population
is much lower.

But Stewart and her team
have needed to get creative
when it comes to meeting
parents, as they are not able
to come into the hospital as
often as they were prior to
the pandemic. Like everyone,
they’ve come to embrace and
rely upon telehealth in ways
they never foresaw.

“They’re able to remain in the
comfort of their home, and we’re
actually able to see them in their
homes in the setting where they
live, which in many cases really
helped us take even better care
of them,” Stewart said. l
jbernstein@jewishexponent.com; 215-832-0740
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM



F TAY-SACHS
R F R E E E E
H eadlines
Election Continued from Page 1
did to elect Biden and Kamala
Harris, and the events of the
past week.

Dan Siegel, Pennsylvania
Jewish outreach director,
Biden for President
Since Siegel joined the Biden
campaign over the summer, his
job has consisted primarily of
conversations. It’s a common
misconception, he said, that
successful campaigns are built
on telling people how to vote.

What he and his team have
found effective is the simple act
of talking to people about what
they care about.

In the case of Jewish voters
that Siegel and the campaign
tried to reach in Pennsylvania,
what they cared about was
Israel, anti-Semitism and
Jewish values. Bringing those
people together via Zoom
meant letting people talk to one
another about what issues felt
most pressing as the election
approached. “It was designed to have people
express themselves Jewishly, and
as Americans,” Siegel said.

On the morning that his
work paid off, Siegel popped
champagne bottles with his
South Philadelphia neighbors
before walking toward City
Hall to take it all in. The shared
feeling of the crowd, he said,
was relief.

Hailie Soifer, executive
director, Jewish Democratic
Council of America
If you’re a Jewish Democrat
in Pennsylvania, it’s likely
that Soifer and the Jewish
Democratic Council of America
called or texted you in the last
few months. And even if you
somehow escaped that, then
you probably saw one of their
digital ads. That’s what happens
when you make 150,000 calls
and texts and spend about
$150,000 in a single state, as the
JDCA did this year.

Both of those numbers repre-
sented a significant chunk of
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM & & TAY-SACHS
CANAVAN CANAVAN
SCREENING SCREENING
she was hesitant to commit to
phone banking.

“I like that he says that he’s
not a red or blue president,”
Schmidt said. “He’ll be a presi-
dent for all of the United States.

And I don’t think those are idle
words.” CALL (215) 887-0877
FOR DETAILS
e-mail: ntsad@aol.com;
visit: www.tay-sachs.org
■ Rachel Beck’s view of a rally to “count every vote.”
JDCA’s expended resources this
election cycle, reflecting how
important the organization
understood Pennsylvania to be
to the Biden campaign’s chances
of victory. JDCA partnered
with groups like Democratic
Jewish Outreach Pennsylvania
to ensure that Democrats would
not lose the state and the election
by the same agonizingly slim
margin that they did in 2016.

For Soifer, Biden’s victory was
a chance to take her children
down to the major celebrations
in downtown D.C. The joy,
the jubilation and flag-waving
wasn’t just novel for them, but
for their mother, too.

“I’ve never seen anything
like it,” Soifer said.

Michael Solomonov, chef,
co-owner, CookNSolo
It actually doesn’t take all that
long to whip up 1,000 orders
of hummus, if you’re locked in
and ready to go. Really, just a
few hours. At least, that’s what
Solomonov said about Director
of Culinary Operations Caitlin
McMillan, who filled the big
order, made by Siegel on behalf
of voters standing in line on
Election Day.

And for those who weren’t
lucky enough to get any
Photo by Rachel Beck
Rachel Beck, organizer, teen
programs coordinator at
Temple Beth Zion-Beth Israel
Beck knew she had one
small window of opportunity
to make a quick run to the
bathroom on Nov. 7; her job for
the day was to clean up after a
rally down by Independence
Mall. Emerging from the
visitor center, she heard a voice
that made her run back to her
friends in the street: it was
Rabbi Annie Lewis, giving the
wrap-up address for the day.

“That’s my rabbi!” Beck
yelled. “That rally in particular was
just such a powerful unity of
labor and organizers in the
faith community, and it just felt
like really bringing together a
lot. That’s really important to
me,” Beck said. “And that was
just a great moment.”
Screening for other
Jewish Genetic Diseases
also available.

This message is sponsored by a friend of
Nat’l Tay-Sachs & Allied Diseases
Association of Delaware Valley
by the deepest political divisions
since the Civil War,” Zipin wrote
in the Jewish Exponent a few
weeks ago. But even if you hadn’t
read those words, you could’ve
deduced Zipin’s determination
by taking a look at the work
of Democratic Jewish Outreach
Pennsylvania, which fundraised,
phone banked and advertised
with great intensity over the last
few months.

“I’m really, really proud
of how we, as an organiza-
tion, organized the Jewish
community in the state of
Pennsylvania to push Joe Biden
towards victory,” she said.

hummus, there were 4,000
doughnuts from Federal Donuts
being distributed as well.

Solomonov explained that
while CookNSolo refrained
from marshaling resources
on behalf of electoral politics
in the past, this year felt too
important to sit out.

Over the last few months,
Solomonov’s been a part of Jill Zipin, founder and chair,
a Zoom cook-along with Democratic Jewish Outreach
Democratic Rep. Debbie Pennsylvania
jbernstein@jewishexponent.com; Wasserman Schultz, and hosted
“We are a nation torn asunder 215-832-0740
an event alongside Democratic
state Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta.

Just a few weeks ago, Doug
Don’t Schlep It, Ship It! Free Pick Up Available!
Emhoff, husband of Kamala
Harris, spoke in support of
Biden outside Zahav.

Susan Schmidt, psychologist
Schmidt, who is “mostly
retired,” still practices psychology
in Bryn Mawr. This year, she
applied to serve on a Biden
campaign subcommittee that
explored ideas about how to
implement improvements to
mental health services in schools.

It was a family affair, in a way; her
sister, an attorney in Connecticut,
served on a subcommittee as well.

A lifelong Democrat,
Schmidt would’ve
been prepared to knock on doors,
if not for the pandemic, but
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