Has this happened to you? Your elderly patient can’t sleep their last night in the hospital before being discharged home with hospice care so the on-call physician orders a sedative-hypnotic. When the patient becomes confused and agitated, a CT scan of the head is ordered. Or how about this one: Your patient with stage IV … Read moreChoosing Wisely in Hospice and Palliative Medicine
In my very first week as a home hospice physician, my mentor, a veteran home hospice doctor told me, “Start a feel-good file. It’s important.” I nodded in agreement, mentally documenting new EHR passwords and the location of the bathroom. I think about the words “feel-good file” often. Honestly, I once found it to be … Read moreThe Feel-Good File
Since 2010, I have been actively engaged The Personal Caring Initiative at Mayo Clinic Health System and I have given a lot of thought to the future of caring for seriously ill people and spent many hours in front of diverse audiences talking about health care and palliative care. Most recently, I have created a … Read moreA Paradigm Shift in Medicine