Subscribe to The Podcast by KevinMD. Watch on YouTube. Catch up on old episodes! Join us as we delve into the complex terrain of end-of-life care and the contentious debate surrounding assisted suicide legislation. Cardiologist Joseph E. Marine offers …
I opened my internal medicine practice almost four decades ago to serve a growing urban community. I gravitated toward the underserved geriatric population as they were vulnerable patients and eventually moved into the bygone realm of house calls for h…
Are advance directives any better than they were four years ago when COVID was surging? Are patients still comfortable with being placed on ventilators? Do physicians better understand how to treat COVID as a serious illness? Physicians provide emerge…
Last month, the daughters of Wendy Miller, a 68-year-old author of three bestselling books about her experience with dementia, posted online her final words: “In the end, I died simply by deciding not to eat or drink anymore.” Her stark sta…
I walk into the patient’s hospital room during evening rounds. He looks pale and tired, having recently completed a round of chemotherapy for his stage IV pancreatic cancer. His wife is at the bedside, scared and concerned about her husband’…
How do you make sense of someone dying? The only way I know is to put it into some context so that, if possible, some good can come of it. Some of you may have known about my dad’s Parkinson’s disease. He’s had a fairly rapid decline …
How do you make sense of someone dying? The only way I know is to put it into some context so that, if possible, some good can come of it. Some of you may have known about my dad’s Parkinson’s disease. He’s had a fairly rapid decline …
We all have those moments in medicine when we know that care has become more futile. Then we do everything in our power to educate, support, gently guide, and give permission to patients and families. There are moments that treating for a cure goes aga…
At a time when many states are considering assisted suicide legislation, I was interested to encounter the perspective of the well-known bioethicist Arthur Caplan who recently expressed his support for these laws on these pages. While I appreciate Capl…
America expends much time, effort, and resources when people become seriously ill, bringing many face-to-face with their own mortality. For patients and their families, it is an emotional and difficult time under the best of circumstances. As a cardiol…
