Mortal Matters

Reverence for Life, Shared Humanity, and Hope

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 16:56:57 GMT

The news of the Marathon Day horrors in Boston reached me in Lambarene, Gabon, where exactly 100 years ago this month Dr. Albert Schweitzer and his wife Helene Breslau arrived to open the African "village hospital" that gained him fame...

Still haunted by a grandmother's suffering

Mon, 01 Apr 2013 20:37:00 GMT

"The end of my grandmother's life proved to be a nightmare", wrote Janet Lynch Schuster in yesterday's New York Times "Sunday Dialogue: Choosing How We Die", clearly still haunted by the way her grandmother died nearly 20 years ago. Why...

A Father's Last Days, the Way He Would Have Wanted

Mon, 25 Mar 2013 20:51:00 GMT

It took a village, my BIDMC colleague Dr. John Halamka wrote in his blog Life as a Healthcare CIO earlier this month, expressing his "Thank You to the Village" as he concluded a deeply-moving series of reports from the front lines...

When in Doubt, Try to Save a Life

Mon, 11 Mar 2013 11:00:00 GMT

What would you do if a frail elderly woman collapsed nearby? Would you rush to start CPR? Or if you don't know CPR, would you scream for help from someone who can?That's not what happened last week when Lorraine Bayless,...

When high costs meet "but it's my Mom"...

Fri, 08 Mar 2013 15:39:00 GMT

Everyone knows we need to do something to rein in out-of-control health care spending, especially for things that are truly wasteful. But as we saw in the early days of health care reform, when the issue is care near the...

One more health system failure -- why do we tolerate this?

Tue, 19 Feb 2013 20:15:00 GMT

Yet another heart-rending story of a patient our health system failed appeared in yesterday's G section of the Boston Globe. Dr. Kiran Gupta recounts the utterly-avoidable suffering inflicted on an elderly chronically-ill woman, who "knew that her lung disease was...

Another health system failure -- this was NOT what she wanted...

Tue, 19 Feb 2013 17:34:58 GMT

Yes another deeply-troubling story of a patient our health system failed appeared in yesterday's G section of the Boston Globe. Dr. Kiran Gupta recounts the deeply-troubling story of an elderly chronically-ill woman, who "knew that her lung disease was slowly...

Why are we bouncing dying patients from place to place?

Mon, 11 Feb 2013 17:37:00 GMT

Consistency in who your caregivers are is often crucial to excellence in care near the end of life. Most transitions from one facility to another are intensely disruptive -- the patient is suddenly in a completely different environment, where s/he...

When Mom Needs "Heroic" Efforts at "Intensive Care" -- Getting it Right

Mon, 04 Feb 2013 11:00:00 GMT

It dawned on me years ago that one of the hardest problems we all face in making choices for care in the face of a serious, life-threatening illness is embedded in our language. The way we use words like "intensive...

Why Not the Best? It's up to each of us.

Mon, 28 Jan 2013 11:00:00 GMT

As Kay Lazar recently wrote in "End-of-Life Care Rarely Discussed", her cover story for the "G" section of the Globe, nearly two years after the Massachusetts Expert Panel on End-of-Life Care set out a roadmap through which the Commonwealth could...

It's NOT about the money

Wed, 16 Jan 2013 15:29:56 GMT

A recent op-ed in the NY Times by Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, titled "Better if not Cheaper Care", reminded me how tragically misguided it is that so many discussions of care near the end of life focus on costs. As Zeke so...

A Holiday Gift for Loved Ones -- and it's free!

Wed, 19 Dec 2012 16:08:33 GMT

Are you still finalizing year-end holiday season gifts for special loved ones? Even if you already have something for everyone, The Conversation Project has an additional idea that fits in anyone's budget -- the "gift of conversation". And not just...

Reverence for Life and Human Mortality

Mon, 17 Dec 2012 10:00:00 GMT

Last weekend a patient of ours at BIDMC died in one of our ICUs. She was young (early 60's), with complications from major surgery, kidney failure, and multiple infections. As sad as it was - especially for a deeply devoted...

Time to "Talk Turkey"

Tue, 20 Nov 2012 23:26:44 GMT

As we gather this week with loved ones, I suspect that few of us have on our wish list a conversation about death and dying. But I also suspect that not a single one of us ever wants to be...

For a "Right to Care" with Dignity, Compassion, and Autonomy: NO on Question 2

Mon, 05 Nov 2012 10:00:01 GMT

I have not heard a single person claim, during debates about Question 2, that the quality of end-of-life care in Massachusetts is acceptable. There is clearly overwhelming agreement that significant improvements are needed. The questions are: What improvements are most...

Assisted Suicide on the Ballot: Beyond Fear Tactics, Part 2

Mon, 29 Oct 2012 21:46:30 GMT

[Author's note: apologies for the inconsistencies in the size of the fonts in this posting. I have not yet mastered all the technical details of the blog's software.] The issues Question 2 raises are truly profound and deeply important --...

Assisted Suicide on the Ballot: Beyond Fear Tactics

Sun, 28 Oct 2012 13:01:00 GMT

Should a doctor in Massachusetts be legally permitted to write a prescription for a patient to use in suicide? On November 6, the people of the Commonwealth will decide. This is an issue about which deeply thoughtful, caring, and...

Thanks, Dad

Mon, 15 Oct 2012 00:13:21 GMT

Tuesday, August 3, 2010, my cell phone rang at work. I explained to a colleague that I don't normally take incoming calls on my phone (my wife and kids have a special ring tone). I ignored the ringing, and...

We're all in this together

Thu, 11 Oct 2012 14:55:39 GMT

Welcome to our blog -- yours and mine. When Ellen Goodman, former Boston Globe syndicated columnist, approached me several months ago about joining her in a proposed weekly blog on Boston.com, I broke my promise to myself not to accept...