More Effective Advance Care Planning and Advance Directives

Sarah Hooper is the Executive Director of the UCSF/UC Hastings Consortium on Law, Science & Health Policy and Adjunct Professor of Law at UC Hastings College of the Law. Through the Consortium, she develops interprofessional programs for faculty and students, including educational curricula and degrees, joint research, and clinical training and service programs. In particular, Sarah led the Consortium’s effort to establish the Medical-Legal Partnership for Seniors clinic (MLPS) and now as its Policy Director is working to scale the model locally and nationally.

Sarah’s research focuses on legal issues in aging and dementia care, including health care decision making and informed consent, capacity, elder financial abuse, the link between health and access to civil justice, and models of comprehensive and coordinated care. She is a 2018 Leaders for Health Equity Fellow with George Washington University.

Sarah teaches or has taught “Elder Law & Policy,” “Law of End of Life Care,” “Medical-Legal Partnership for Seniors Seminar,” “Concentration in Law & Health Science Seminar,” “Health Law: Research Compliance & Ethics” and “Master of Studies in Law for Healthcare Providers Seminar” at UC Hastings and is a frequent guest lecturer at UCSF.

Charles Sabatino is an adjunct professor at the Georgetown University Law Center, where he has taught a seminar on law and aging since 1987. He is a past president of the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys (2001-02) and is past chair of its public policy committee.

Prior to joining the ABA, Mr. Sabatino was the elder law project attorney and managing attorney of the Arlington, Virginia, branch of Legal Services of Northern Virginia. He is a member of the District of Columbia and Virginia bar associations.

Mr. Sabatino received an A.B. from Cornell University and a J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center in Washington.

Amy Berman is a Senior Program Officer with The John A. Hartford Foundation. She heads the Foundation’s development and dissemination of innovative, cost-effective Models of Care that improve health outcomes for older adults. Among these efforts, Dr. Berman is responsible for the Foundation’s work on Age-Friendly Health Systems, as well as work to advance palliative care. She has directed a number of Foundation collaborations with federal partners including the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation, the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, and the Administration for Community Living.

Dr. Berman openly shares her experiences living with Stage IV breast cancer. She has presented to the Institute on Medicine and has authored numerous pieces about her health care choices, palliative care and implications for patients, practice and policy. Her piece in Health Affairs, Living Life In My Own Way—And Dying That Way As Well, was among the journal’s most read in 2012. She has been featured in The New York Times, Forbes, on CBS Evening News, and on NPR’s Diane Rehm Show. She can be followed on Twitter as @johnahartford and @notesonnursing.

Prior to the Foundation, Dr. Berman served as Nursing Education Initiatives Director for the Hartford Institute for Geriatric Nursing at New York University College of Nursing. Among her responsibilities at New York University, Dr. Berman developed resources and programs to improve the geriatric expertise of nursing educators and clinicians. She conducted a national survey on gerontological nursing content in baccalaureate programs cited in the Institute on Medicine’s report, Retooling for an Aging America: Building the Health Care Workforce.

Before joining New York University, Dr. Berman worked in home health care administration for twenty years with responsibility for quality improvement, health information technology, accreditation, and regulatory compliance. She served as JCAHO coordinator and as accreditation consultant in performance improvement for a variety of health care institutions. Dr. Berman served on the New York State Department of Health's Emergency Preparedness Task Force and on the professional advisory boards of health care institutions in New York City.

Dr. Berman is an appointed member of CMS’ Partnership for Patients Patient and Family Engagement Network and the Aging Task Force for Healthy People 2020. She is a member of Academy Health, the Gerontological Society of America, and the honor society of nursing, Sigma Theta Tau.

Dr. Berman has been the recipient of numerous honors for her advocacy on behalf of older adults and those facing serious illness. She received the President’s Award from the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine, the Presidential Award from the National Coalition for Cancer Survivorship, the President’s Award from the National League for Nursing for reshaping nursing education, and the Civitas Award from the American Academy of Nursing for her policy and advocacy efforts. The international honor society of nursing, Sigma Theta Tau, established the Amy J. Berman Geriatric Nurse Leadership Award in 2012, which is awarded at their biennial meeting.

She earned a Doctorate of Humane Letters from Quinnipiac University, a Bachelor of Science degree in nursing from New York University College of Nursing, a Bachelor of Science degree in health care administration from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and a Geriatric Scholar Certificate from the Consortium of New York Geriatric Education Centers.

David M. Godfrey, J.D., is a senior attorney to the American Bar Association Commission on Law and Aging in Washington DC. He is responsible for the ABA’s role in the Administration on Community Living funded National Center on Law and Elder Rights and for producing the ABA National Aging and Law Conference. David’s expertise includes supported decision making, advance care planning, health care decision making, legal service delivery, legal ethics, and LGBT aging. Prior to joining the Commission he was responsible for elder law programming at Access to Justice Foundation in Kentucky.

Mr. Godfrey earned his B.A. with honors at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida, and his J.D. cum laude from the University Of Louisville School Of Law in Kentucky.