Commenter and friend Derek pointed me to this story making the rounds today.
One look at Eileen Mulligan lying soberly on the exam table and Dr. John Marshall knew the time for the Big Talk had arrived.
He began gently. The chemotherapy is not helping. The cancer is advanced. There are no good options left to try. It would be good to look into hospice care.
"At first I was really shocked. But after, I thought it was a really good way of handling a situation like that," said Mulligan…
Many people do not get such straight talk from doctors, who often think they are doing patients a favor by keeping hope alive.
New research shows they are wrong.
Only one-third of terminally ill cancer patients in a new, federally funded study said their doctors had discussed end-of-life care.
Surprisingly, patients who had these talks were no more likely to become depressed than those who did not, the study found. They were less likely to spend their final days in hospitals, tethered to machines. They avoided costly, futile care. And their loved ones were more at peace after they died.
The word "surprisingly" in that last paragraph amuses me in a bitter sort of way — it doesn't surprise me at all that patients don't get depressed when their doctors are honest. (Nor does it surprise me that only a third of patients hear about end-of-life care from their doctors.) This is a really, really important finding, and I hope people pay attention to it. A patient's right-to-know bill is in the works in California. I haven't seen the details of the bill, but whether it's well-crafted or not, let's hope it raises public awareness.
People need time to prepare, and doctors owe it to them to give them the information they need up front.
bearing blog 