As a pediatric oncologist, palliative care physician, and patient-reported outcomes and Phase I and end-of- life care clinical investigator at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, Dr Baker is intimately aware of the distress experienced by children with advanced cancer and the communication and end-of-life/bereavement issues surrounding their disease progression. Dr Baker currently serves as the Chief of the Division of Quality of Life and Palliative Care at St. Jude. He was a founding team member of the Quality of Life for All (QOLA) Service – the St. Jude palliative care team. Additionally, he founded and continues to lead the St Jude Bereaved Parent Steering Council and Bereaved Parent Mentoring Program.
His research interests include communication and decision-making in advancing cancer, ethical considerations surrounding enrollment in Phase I clinical trials, AYA palliative oncology care, grief and bereavement issues, integrating palliative care into the ongoing care of children with cancer as well as patient-reported outcomes and pain and symptom control in the context of pediatric oncology care. Dr Baker is an internationally recognized physician-scientist (>250 publications) with extensive research and clinical experience in communication skills training at the intersection of pediatric oncology and palliative care. He has overseen the implementation of >100 clinical research studies at SJCRH. Additionally, he has extensive experience with development and implementation of communication education, including the creation and dissemination and publication of communication skills training at the institution and on national and international platforms. Dr Baker has received many awards for his work including the Hastings Center Cunniff-Dixon Award as well as being named an AAHPM Inspirational Leader in Hospice and Palliative Medicine.
In sum, Dr Baker is a recognized international expert and leader in the field of Pediatric Palliative Oncology as well as a highly sought-after speaker (see TEDxMemphis talk) and mentor with a track record of success.
Dr. Baker has been married to his college sweetheart (beautiful Monny from Monterrey, Mexico) for more than two decades and he and his wife are proud parents of four incredible children. An interesting fact about Dr. Baker is that he likely has more stuffed koala bears than any other individual on the planet and has even has a koala bobblehead and has had numerous koalas “adopted” in his name.

Yoshi (Yoshiyuki Kizawa) is a Director of the Department of Palliative and Supportive Care at the University of Tsukuba Hospital and the Professor of Palliative Medicine at the University of Tsukuba, Faculty of Medicine. He has been re-elected as President of the Japanese Society for palliative medicine in Japan, which has more than 12000 members. Yoshi leads an education program that aims to acquire basic skills of palliative care for all health care professionals to improve the quality of life of patients and families who are in life-threatening conditions. The national primary palliative care education project namely PEACE (Palliative care Emphasis program on symptom management and Assessment for Continuous medical Education) was launched in 2007 funded by the Japanese government and disseminated all over Japan. Until March 2022, more than 150,000 physicians finished the 2-day education course. This educational project very much contributes improving the integration of palliative care in oncology in our country. (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29023634) He also has a strong interest in non-cancer palliative care and advance care planning. He has started implementing a palliative care program for patients with heart failure in his university hospital. Yoshi also leads a National Advance Care Planning Education Project, funded by the Japanese government, namely E-FIELD ( Education for Implementing End-of-life Discussion). (https://www.med.kobe-u.ac.jp/jinsei/acp_kobe-u/acp_kobe-u/acp01/index.html)

Amy Y. M. Chow is a Professor with the Department of Social Work and Social Administration, The University of Hong Kong. She is the Director of the Jockey Club End-of-Life Community Care Project and the Master of New College of the University. With the background of registered social worker specialized in bereavement counseling, she is the founder of the first community based bereavement counseling centre in Hong Kong. She is also the Chairperson of the International Workgroup on Death, Dying and Bereavement and the former Secretary of the Association for Death Education and Counseling. Recently, she received the Association for Death Education and Counseling 2020 Research Recognition Award.

Dr. David Hui is a tenured professor and Director of Research at the Department of Palliative Care, Rehabilitation and Integrative Medicine, with a joint appointment to the Department of General Oncology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, USA. His research interests include integration of supportive/palliative care and oncology, symptom management clinical trials, prognostication, and research methodology. He completed his medical school at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, followed by internal medicine residency at the University of Alberta, Edmonton, medical oncology fellowship at the British Columbia Cancer Agency, and supportive/palliative oncology clinical research fellowship at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. He also has a Master’s degree in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, and a second Master’s degree in Patient Based Biological Research. He is board certified in Internal Medicine and Medical Oncology in Canada and the US, and also Palliative Care and Hospice Medicine in the US.

He is currently the principal investigator of multiple randomized trials on dyspnea and delirium funded by the National Cancer Institute. His research is also supported by the National Institute of Nursing Research, the American Cancer Society and other agencies. He has authored and/or co-authored over 300 scientific papers, with his work appearing at various peer-review journals such as JAMA, JAMA Oncol, J Clin Oncol, CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians, Lancet Oncol and Ann Oncol. He is also the author/editor of 4 books (Approach to Internal Medicine, Drugs & Drugs, and Internal Medicine Issues in Palliative Cancer Care, 50 Palliative Care Studies Every Doctor Should Know).

Dr. Hui currently serves as a standing member of a study section at the National Institutes of Health. He is also a senior associate editor of the Journal of Pain and Symptom Management and a board member of the Multinational Association of Supportive Care in Cancer. In addition to academic pursuits, he remains active clinically in both palliative care and medical oncology.

Dr. Yuen-Liang Lai is a professor of MacKay Medical College, and Taipei Medical University in Taiwan. His specialty is radiation oncology and palliative medicine. He was the former chairman of Asia Pacific Hospice Palliative Care Network (APHN), Taiwan Hospice Organization, and the founding chairman of Taiwan Academy of Hospice Palliative Medicine (TAHPM). Now he is the board member of Taiwan Spiritual Care Professionals Association and TAHPM to devote himself to integrate humanity and technology in the new era of palliative medicine developed in Taiwan.

He received his diploma in Palliative Medicine from University of Wales College of Medicine in United Kingdom. After brief stints as a clinical fellow at Royal North Shore Hospital in Australia and Cleveland Clinic Cancer Center in U.S., he was appointed to the Department of Radiation Oncology at MacKay Memorial Hospital as a director. From 1990 to 2009, he had served as the first medical director in MacKay Hospice Palliative Care Center which is the pioneer hospice palliative care ward in Taiwan.

Dr. Lai has made nearly 200 scholarly contributions, including more than 100 peer-reviewed research papers. His research interests include integration of palliative care and oncology, symptom management. He also works out the evidence basis to say no to the medical futilities. In addition to being co-investigator on numerous clinical trials and researches, he performed a pivotal role in developing the first novel botanical drug approved for improving cancer-related fatigue among cancer patients.

A qualified general practitioner/ family physician and specialist in palliative medicine from the UK, with many years’ experience working in Nepal and South Asia. He is currently living and working in rural Nepal developing a model of primary palliative care. He has a PhD in Health Sciences from Warwick Medical School, UK which he undertook within the Centre for Primary Health Care Studies. His thesis focused on the interface between primary and secondary care in delivering palliative care. He led palliative care research at Warwick Medical School between 2003 and 2013 including evaluating the Gold Standards Framework, an international approach enabling primary care practitioners to provide excellent palliative care. He first worked in Nepal in 1988-1991 and then returned in 2013 since which time he has been working with Nepali colleagues in developing appropriate palliative care. His current academic base is with the Primary Palliative Care Research Group in the Usher Institute, University of Edinburgh. In 2021, together with colleagues in the region he established the Asia Pacific Primary Palliative Care Special Interest Group which has been adopted by APHN.

He's Professor Emeritus of Internal Medicine at the Seoul National University Medical College. His specialty is medical oncology and palliative medicine. He is the author of more than 300 research papers and scientific reviews.
From Dec 2008 to Nov 2011, he had served as a CEO of National Evidence-based Healthcare Collaborating Agency and has involved in many national projects regarding healthcare policies in Korea.
He had worked as the president of the Korean Association for Hospice-Palliative Care from 2014 to 2015. In addition to that, he contributed to legislation of “Act on Hospice and Palliative Care and Decisions on Life-sustaining Treatment for Patients at the End-of-Life”.
From 2015 to 2017, he had served as the president of the Korean Society for Medical Ethics. In addition, he performed a pivotal role in establishing ethics education program at the Seoul National University Medical College and the Hospital Ethics Committee at the Seoul National University Hospital.
He has been the director of the Patient-Centered Clinical Research Coordinating Center supported by the Ministry of Health and Welfare, Korea since 2019.

David W. Kissane, MD is an academic psychiatrist, palliative care physician and researcher in the fields of psycho-oncology and palliative care. He currently holds the Chair of Palliative Care Research with the University of Notre Dame Australia and the Cunningham Centre at St Vincent’s Hospital, Sydney (2019-present). He has previously been Head of the Department of Psychiatry for Monash University in Australia (2012-2019), Chairman of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York (2003-2012) and, before that, the Foundation Chair of Palliative Medicine at the University of Melbourne (1996-2003).

Professor Kissane’s academic interests include studies of existential distress, group, couples and family psychotherapy trials, communication skills training, and the ethics of end-of-life care. He is best known for his work on demoralization syndrome as a specifier for adjustment disorder and major depression in the medically ill, a form of low morale and poor coping that has preceded interventions to promote meaning-based coping. His model of family therapy delivered to ‘at risk’ families during palliative care has prevented complicated grief and prolonged grief disorder in bereavement. He has developed the Demoralization Scale (DS & DS-II), the Demoralization Interview (DI), the Psycho-existential Symptom Assessment Scale (PeSAS) and the Shame and Stigma Scale (SSS) in Head & Neck Cancer. He is the author of over 400 publications, including books exemplified by Oxford Textbook of Communication in Oncology and Palliative Care, Psychotherapy in Cancer Care, Bereavement Care for Families, and Psycho-oncology in Palliative and End-of-Life Care.

Prof Kissane has been recognised by the International Psycho-Oncology Society with its Sutherland Award for lifetime achievement, by Cornell University with its Klerman Award for psychotherapy research, by King’s College with its Dame Cecily Saunders lecture, and in 2018, he was made a Companion in the Order of Australia (AC) for his contribution to the development of the disciplines of Psycho-oncology and Palliative Care.