Ep. 56 - Risking Love: Hospice, Palliative Care, and Humanity Behind Bars

In this powerful episode, longtime HPNA member Linda Blum, APRN shares experiences from the last few years of her rich nursing career in volunteerism —training incarcerated caregivers in a California state prison hospice program. Linda explores the ethical complexity of end-of-life care behind bars, from POLST conflicts and CPR decisions to pain management in a correctional setting where Medicare rules don’t apply.

Through ELNEC education and interdisciplinary collaboration, she’s helping nurses, correctional officers, and incarcerated caregivers reclaim agency and restore dignity at the end of life. This conversation examines moral distress, serious illness communication, and the transformative power of “risking love” in some of the most marginalized settings.

A moving reflection on bearing witness, professional courage, and the light within us all.

About Humane Prison Hospice Project

The Humane Prison Hospice Project is developing a humanitarian, cost-effective, and transformative solution to ensure that those aging and dying in prison receive compassionate care. Since 2017, the Humane Prison Hospice Project has worked to ensure that incarcerated individuals receive compassionate end-of-life care from trained peers. Humane implements a comprehensive 80-hour, 15-module curriculum to train incarcerated individuals as peer caregivers, equipping them with the skills to provide hands-on care and emotional support to their aging and terminally ill peers. Graduates of this program are part of a growing movement to humanize end-of-life care behind bars. Since launching this initiative, we have trained over 150 peer caregivers across California prisons, and are bringing our programming to three states—Michigan, Washington, and Oregon—marking our first step toward national replication. Learn more on their website: https://humaneprisonhospiceproject.org/

For anyone listening who has experience in hospice, nursing, programming in prisons or facilitating, and you live in CA, WA, MI, or OR, Humane is seeking volunteer facilitators who participate in trainings for peer caregivers in prisons across each state. We'd love to hear from you -- please reach out to Camila Ryder at camila@humaneprisonhospiceproject.org with your name, location, and any relevant experience. If you're interested in learning more, register via Zoom for one of our virtual monthly Informational Meetings.

Linda Blum, GNP, MSN, RN Linda Blum, GNP, MSN, RN, is a retired gerontological nurse practitioner living in California. Born and raised in New York State, she moved to the Bay Area over 45 years ago. Her early career included work in virology and immunology laboratories before she left a PhD program after the birth of her first child. She later worked as a birth doula and photographer and entered nursing school intending to become a nurse midwife. Instead, her path led her to the care of people with serious illness. She often jokes that she has a poor sense of direction and found end of life, not beginning of life, as she prefers anxious children to anxious parents.

Linda worked in home infusion and home hospice as a case manager and manager before returning to school for her at UCSF and then completing a palliative medicine fellowship at the VA in Palo Alto. She was hired as the first clinician to provide palliative care/medicine consultation at California Pacific Medical Center.

Since retiring in 2023, Linda has volunteered her time and expertise with the Humane Prison Hospice Project, where she facilitates training for incarcerated individuals serving as peer caregivers. Her passion is helping to train nurses and professional staff in the carceral setting using a modified ELNEC curriculum.

Linda enjoys traveling, caring for her grandchildren, and telling silly jokes and puns. Her spirit animal is a penguin—preferably a Gentoo—and if you ask for photos, your inbox may quickly overflow.

Brett Snodgrass, DNP, FNP-C, ACHPN®, FAANP Dr. Brett Snodgrass has been a registered nurse for 28 years and a Family Nurse Practitioner for 18 years, practicing in multiple settings, including family practice, urgent care, emergency departments, administration, chronic pain and palliative medicine. She is currently the Operations Director for Palliative Medicine at Baptist Health Systems in Memphis, TN. She is board certified with the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners. She is also a Fellow of the American Association of Nurse Practitioners and an Advanced Certified Hospice and Palliative Nurse. She completed a Doctorate of Nursing Practice at the University of Alabama – Huntsville. She is a nationally recognized nurse practitioner speaker and teacher. Brett is a chronic pain expert, working for more than 20 years with chronic pain and palliative patients in a variety of settings. She is honored to be the HPNA 2025 podcast host. She is married with two daughters, two son in laws, one grandson, and now an empty nest cat. She and her family are actively involved in their church and she is an avid reader.