Death Wishes
2014-09-18 - by
Like many people who have more years behind them than ahead of them, I regularly read the obituaries. First I look for people or families I know. Then I look for their ages. Then I look for the signs of how they died. Many times it says “after a long period of declining health,” “after a long and valiant struggle with (fill in the blank),” etc.
So I was struck by a new study, “Dying in America,” which says, “Americans suffer needless discomfort and undergo unwanted and costly care as they die, in part because of a medical system ruled by perverse incentives for aggressive care and not enough conversation about what people want.”
How many of us want to be kept alive by machines and invasive procedures that add a few weeks or months to our lives, but nothing to the quality of our lives?
Maybe this is something we famously selfish and self-absorbed Baby Boomers can do for our country. After all, a huge chunk of the national health care bill – like Medicare – goes to end-of-life care. Let’s save the next generation some money and save ourselves some suffering. Let’s get serious about planning for the end so we can be at home and free from pain, respirators, feeding tubes and powerful drugs. Let’s get over Sarah Palin’s rhetoric about “death panels” and get serious.
Posted in General
Death Wishes
2014-09-18/
Like many people who have more years behind them than ahead of them, I regularly read the obituaries. First I look for people or families I know. Then I look for their ages. Then I look for the signs of how they died. Many times it says “after a long period of declining health,” “after a long and valiant struggle with (fill in the blank),” etc.
So I was struck by a new study, “Dying in America,” which says, “Americans suffer needless discomfort and undergo unwanted and costly care as they die, in part because of a medical system ruled by perverse incentives for aggressive care and not enough conversation about what people want.”
How many of us want to be kept alive by machines and invasive procedures that add a few weeks or months to our lives, but nothing to the quality of our lives?
Maybe this is something we famously selfish and self-absorbed Baby Boomers can do for our country. After all, a huge chunk of the national health care bill – like Medicare – goes to end-of-life care. Let’s save the next generation some money and save ourselves some suffering. Let’s get serious about planning for the end so we can be at home and free from pain, respirators, feeding tubes and powerful drugs. Let’s get over Sarah Palin’s rhetoric about “death panels” and get serious.
Posted in General