About the SUNSET Program and Our Staff

The SUNSET Program, provided by the Ohio State University Office of Geriatrics and Gerontology, is an opportunity for those providing end of life care to older adults to obtain valuable continuing education and professional development in a broad range of end of life issues. The program development team hopes you find the education useful and inspirational as you provide responsive care for important people at the most important time in their lives.

Patrice Rancour, MS, RN, PMHCNS-BC, Lead Author for the SUNSET Program, is a master's prepared nurse with 50 years of experience in the mental health care field as a clinician, educator and consultant. 

She received both her undergraduate and graduate degrees in nursing at Ohio State University. Special areas of interest include spirituality and healing, integrative therapies, compassion fatigue, psychoneuroimmunology, end-of-life care, grief and loss, and working with people who have life-threatening illnesses. She has published extensively and given numerous conference and symposium presentations.

Tales From The Pager Chronicles, penned by SUNSET Author Patrice Rancour, is the narrative nonfiction account of a day in the life of a nurse behaviorist working in an academic oncology hospital.  As her pager summons her from one clinical situation to the next, each contact with the next patient, with the next family, becomes a call to provide the kind of end-of-life care that SUNSET aims to promote.  If you want a practical hands-on application of the concepts espoused by SUNSET, you might be interested in ordering a copy for yourself or your staff.

Program Staff

Jennifer Bechtel, Program Manager
Office of Geriatrics and Gerontology
210D Hamilton Hall
1645 Neil Avenue
Columbus, Ohio 43210
E-mail:  jennifer.bechtel@osumc.edu
Phone: 614-293-4815 (Main)
Columbus, Ohio 43210