Doctors may treat dying patients for too long
UK – Inquiry into end-of-life care finds some doctors carry on giving treatment to dying patients because of pressure
UK – Inquiry into end-of-life care finds some doctors carry on giving treatment to dying patients because of pressure
There is an unspoken dark side of modern medicine–keeping patients alive at any price. Two thirds of Americans die in healthcare institutions, tethered to machines and tubes, even though research shows that most prefer to die at home in comfort, surrounded by loved ones.
USA – In the U.S. health-care system, it’s often unclear who should talk to patients about end-of-life care options.
What is it like to mourn today, in a culture that has largely set aside rituals that acknowledge grief? After her mother died of cancer at the age of fifty-five, Meghan O’Rourke found that nothing had prepared her for the intensity of her sorrow.
USA – Ten-year-old Oscar has been comforting patients in their dying days at Steere House Nursing centre since he was a kitten. Staff and doctors at the Rhode Island centre are baffled by Oscar’s natural ability to seek out the dying and
UK – Instead of trying to outwit mortal disease, we should be learning to face our fate with courage. I’m writing this after hearing an apparently innocuous and encouraging snippet of news – that a new lung cancer treatment is capable of giving
A test to determine if elderly patients will die within 30 days of being admitted to hospital has been developed by doctors to give them the chance to go home or say goodbye to loved ones. Experts say this will prevent futile and expensive medical treatments which prolong suffering.
IRELAND – Ireland supposedly ‘does death well’. But a new survey suggests that it’s a modern taboo – and that end-of-life care in