Butler Health System has received a national award for its palliative care staff.

BHS was one of 24 organizations to win the John A. Hartford Foundation Tipping Point Challenge, which was hosted by the Center to Advance Palliative Care.

“It was really a big deal to win this,” said Dr. Kathy Selvaggi, director of the palliative care program for BHS.

More than 1,500 health care institutions participated in the challenge, which is meant to innovate and improve the way health care providers treat patients living with serious illnesses.

Winners were selected based on the amount of training completed through the CAPC online portal.

Selvaggi said BHS has a membership with the CAPC, allowing all of its employees to access its training programs for free.

“We get a lot of educational supplementation on the CAPC website,” she said. “It's really an excellent resource.”

Selvaggi said BHS made it a point to answer the challenge's call to action. She said the training was not only useful, but it also served as continuing medical education for its employees, who all have professional requirements to meet.

Selvaggi said they made some of the online training mandatory or highly recommended to employees across varying fields, including physicians, nurses, social workers and pharmacists.

“People really got educated about symptom management, having difficult conversations and how to care for patients with a serious illness,” Selvaggi said.

BHS will receive a certificate of achievement.

“The enthusiasm and heightened activity of health care organizations across the country to rapidly enhance skills that are not usually the focus of training in medical school is a testament to the thirst and extraordinary need to improve the quality of care provided to people living with serious illness,” said Dr. Diane E. Meier, director of the CAPC,

Selvaggi said the effort they put in this year will not end with the challenge.

She said she plans to continue pushing CAPC education to continue supporting patients who struggle with serious and lifelong illnesses.

“This is really a feather in our cap,” Selvaggi said.