Imperative 4 To be honest. Nothing can shatter a relationship more quickly and more completely than dishonesty. To be sure, we do not hit people over the head with the truth they are not prepared to hear. That would be cruel. We must rigorously avoid a self-serving deflection of crucial issues and truths in order […]
honest, gentle and kind … Read More »
A subitanea morte, libera nos, Domine … “from a death that is sudden and unprepared for, deliver us, o Lord.” To be taken away suddenly, without being able to make oneself ready, without having had time to prepare – this is the supreme danger from which man wants to be saved. He wants to be
Imperative 6 To be joyful. Laughter and joy can be a more effective medicine than anything we hope to produce in a laboratory. The joy of medicine was given to me by my patients. I will always remember the day I sat in the bedroom of a hospice patient who was surrounded by his immediate
Imperative 7 To be knowledgeable. There is so much I don’t know that if I had a lick of sense, I would use my medical diploma to line my kitchen cabinets. The single greatest sin I can commit as a physician is to know not and know not that I know not. To be knowledgeable,
to be knowledgeable … Read More »
… “On television, death is presented as a thrilling spectacle tailor-made for alleviating the general boredom of life. In the last analysis, of course, the covert aim of this reduction of death to the status of an object is just the same as with the bourgeois taboo on the subject. Death is to be deprived
death trivialized … Read More »
William Utermohlen’s series of self-portraits after his diagnosis of dementia. NYT essay slide show JMP article
descent into dementia … Read More »
Imperative 8 To be courageous. Courage is contagious. The defining moments of history have been immortalized because common men and women inspired others with their courage and together they all accomplished the seemingly impossible. No one and no thing must ever cause us to shirk our duty to a patient who relies on us to
to be courageous … Read More »
… don’t push (“righting reflex”) but reflect … Pollack et. al. discuss how to talk with patients and families when they are resistant to discussing the future or are ambivalent and unable to make a decision. Criteria to know if we have been successful … Letting patients talk as much as clinicians; Keeping question-asking to
in settings of ambivalence and resistance … Read More »
“Liberalism and illuminism want to insinuate us in a world without fear; they promise to do away with every type of fear. They wish to eliminate every dependency on another and its intimate tension. This search for security is founded on a total auto-affirmation of the self which denies the risk of going out of
a world without fear … ? Read More »
Swetenham et al and Hegarty etal study the impact of refractory suffering on the interdisciplinary team. “Refractory suffering – that is, suffering that persists unrelieved despite all attempts by an interdisciplinary team to ameliorate it, is one of the most difficult and challenging aspects of palliative care practice. Its effects on clinicians have been documented.
the precarious nature of the team when challenges are faced … Read More »
