About
CCM Founder Celia Engel Bandman
CCM Founder Bernard Bandman, PhD
CCM Founder Patricia A. Barr, JD
Our History
The Center for Communication in Medicine (CCM) is the education division of the Institute of Medical Humanism, a Bennington, VT based nonprofit organization.
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Since 2001 our educational programs and tools have helped patients and loved ones prepare for conversations with healthcare providers, leading to improved communication about treatment options, quality of life considerations and supportive care needs.
Founders, psychologist Bernard Bandman, writer Celia Engel Bandman and patient, lawyer, and national healthcare advocate Patricia Barr (1950-2002) recognized that medicine is a world with its own language where time was at a premium. This is still true! Patients often find themselves unprepared to be effective communicators.
With this in mind CCM designed and implemented its innovative ‘medical humanist’ program at Southwestern Vermont Regional Cancer Center (2002-2005) to help facilitate doctor-patient communication. The ‘medical humanist’ documented the patients’ perspective of illness for the cancer care team which identified what may have been misunderstood or unspoken during the office visit. Building on the success of the cancer center program CCM developed the Difficult Conversations Toolkit, now revised as SpeakSooner: A Patient’s Guide to Difficult Conversations, to help patients identify their questions and concerns in preparation for opening honest dialogues with healthcare providers.
CCM’s SpeakSooner Initiative was launched in 2013 to prepare patients to open timely and frank conversations with healthcare providers; help family, friends and caregivers identify needed supports; and engage doctors in inviting patients to ask questions and express concerns. SpeakSooner programs in medical practices and community have been changing the way people are communicating about healthcare needs and supports.
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Michael J. Welther, MD
President
Scott J. Burg, MA
Bennington, VT
Leslie Burg, Ed. D.
Manchester, VT
Kevin P. Dailey, JD
Arlington, VT
Michael A. Keane
North Bennington, VT
Laura Moore
Durham, NH
Allison Niemi, MD
Bennington, VT
Sara Ames, AOCNP
Adirondack Health at Saranac Lake, NY
Bernard M. Bandman, PhD
Ex Officio
Patricia A. Barr, JD
In Memoriam 1950-2003
Gary David Goldberg
In Memoriam 1945-2013
ADVISORY BOARD
Susan Bauer-Wu, RN, PhD
University of Virginia (retired), Charlottesville VA
Stephen Berns, MD
University of Vermont, Burlington, VT
Elaine Meyer, PhD, RN, MBE
Harvard Center for Bioethics, Boston, MA
Joann Oseary
Los Angeles, CA
Lidia Schapira, MD
Stanford Medicine, Palo Alto, CA
David Schroedel
Sleepy Hollow, NY
Jason Touhey, DO
Berkshire Health, Pittsfield, MA
Bruce Nash, MD, MBA
President, Catamount Advisors, Shaftsbury, VT
Col. James Baker (ret.)
JW Leadership Consulting, Arlington, VT
OUR MISSION
The Center for Communication in Medicine’s SpeakSooner initiative prepares patients facing serious illness, and their family caregivers, for honest and timely conversations with healthcare providers, leading to decisions about care that honor a person’s values, priorities and goals.
WHO WE ARE
BERNARD BANDMAN, PhD
Dr. Bandman established the psychological services program in 1988 at Southwestern Vermont Regional Cancer Center in Bennington, VT. He is a founder and the Executive Director of the Center for Communication in Medicine, a Bennington, VT non-profit that develops programs and tools to improve communication between patients, families and healthcare professionals. Dr. Bandman spearheads the SpeakSooner initiative, which offers educational and training programs in healthcare communication. He has been featured on Vermont Public Radio and NPR, appears in Dana Farber Cancer Institute’s Living Beyond Cancer video library and produced the Difficult Conversations Video and Workbook, newly revised as SpeakSooner: A Patient’s Guide to Difficult Conversations.
CELIA ENGEL BANDMAN
Ms. Bandman created and implemented the pioneering role of medical humanist on an interdisciplinary team at Southwestern Vermont Regional Cancer Center in Bennington, VT. In the pilot program (2002-2005) Ms. Bandman documented the patient’s understanding of their diagnosis, prognosis and the effects of illness on themselves and family for the medical record, which served as a tool to facilitate communication and re-address misunderstandings. In 2006, building on the success of the medical humanist model she helped launch the Center for Communication in Medicine. Ms. Bandman is a writer and educator whose articles have been published in Journal of the American Medical Association, Journal of Clinical Oncology, Journal of Supportive Oncology and Journal of Cancer Education. She has been interviewed about her innovative work on TV, NPR, Vermont Public Radio and in print media. Ms. Bandman produced the Difficult Conversations video and created its accompanying workbook revised as SpeakSooner: A Patient’s Guide to Difficult Conversations.
IN THE NEWS & PRESENTATIONS
Stanford Medicine
Lecture
Getting Patients, Families and Healthcare Providers on the Same Page, in partnership with Stanford Palliative Care
Adirondack Health at Saranac Lake
Lecture (Medical Grand Rounds)
Improving Healthcare Communication: The SpeakSooner Model in Medical Practice
UVM College of Medicine
Lecture (Family Medicine Grand Rounds)
Difficult Conversations in Primary Care
Southwestern Vermont Medical Center
Lecture (Clinical Communications Rounds)
Difficult Conversations: Challenges for Patients, Families and Healthcare Team
Brattleboro Memorial Hospital
Lecture (Primary Care Grand Rounds)
Getting Patients, Families & Healthcare Providers on the Same Page
MD Anderson Cancer Center
Seminar
A New Framework for Treatable but Incurable Diagnoses
Dana Farber Cancer Institute
Lecture
12th Annual Prostate Cancer Symposium: Men Do Talk
Vermont Public Radio
On-Air Report
Interview highlighting CCM’s Doctors Conversation Hour
Brown University Medical School
Seminar
Humanism in Medical Education
WNYT Channel 13
Interview
Anchor Benita Zahn, CCM co-founder Dr. Bernard Bandman, and patient Kiki Smith, talk about challenges of doctor-patient communication.
LATEST PRESS RELEASE
SpeakSooner Fall Webinar
Artificial Intelligence (AI) has become a major influence in our culture – including in our medical system. What do we need to know to make informed decisions about care? And, how do we maintain the human side of medicine while using this powerful tool?
The Center for Communication in Medicine (CCM) has assembled a panel of experts who will explore the benefits and concerns in using AI in medical practice. We will hear from those directly affected – both clinicians and patients.
Doctor-Patient Communication: Where Does Artificial Intelligence Fit In? – CCM’s Fall Community Education Webinar will be presented on Wednesday, October 21 at 6pm. Video interviews from our 2023 webinar exploring this topic will be replayed to launch the conversation of how the use of AI has changed and how we can make use of this advanced technology without compromising professional ethics and standards.
Our 2026 panelists include: Benjamin A. Gartrell, MD, Director, Genitourinary Malignancy Program at Montefiore Medical Center, Bronx. NY and an Assistant Professor of Oncology and Urology at our Albert Einstein College of Medicine; David Schroedel, cancer patient; Jason Touhey, DO, internal medicine specialist and Chief Informatics Officer at Berkshire Medical Pittsfield, MA; and a current medical student. Together they will discuss the fast-paced changes in our use of AI in medical practice, how this affects patients and families, and how to maintain ethical values and humane treatment of patients facing serious illness.
Audience Q&A will be available via the chat. The webinar is free and open to the public.