Sunday, September 29, 2019

‘Out here, it’s just me’: In the medical desert of rural America, one doctor for 11,000 square miles - The Washington Post

He woke up to the sound of an ambulance's siren, knowing that the ambulance would soon be delivering another patient to him. Ed Garner, 68, changed into medical scrubs and walked out to his truck. He dialed the hospital as he started driving toward the emergency room.

"Any idea what might be coming?" he asked, but all anyone knew for certain was that the ambulance was still on its way out to a patient. Sometimes the paramedics were back within minutes, and other trips took nearly two hours. Sometimes they delivered Garner a patient in minor distress, and other times they brought him unresponsive victims of car crashes, heart attacks, drug overdoses or ranching accidents.

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https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/out-here-its-just-me/2019/09/28/fa1df9b6-deef-11e9-be96-6adb81821e90_story.html?

What a 'good death' actually looks like - The Washington Post

At age 86, my father had survived both colon cancer and a stroke that left him with aphasia. His mind was sharp, though, and he wasn't depressed. A crack bridge player with a passion for Italian restaurants, he was popular at his assisted living facility even though he couldn't speak much. He told me he'd lived a good life and wasn't afraid of dying, and he didn't want to go through any more medical trauma. No chemo, no radiation, no surgeries, no treatment.

His advance directive read DNR and DNI — do not resuscitate, do not intubate. No one would break his ribs doing CPR or make bruises bloom along his arms trying to find a vein. As his health-care proxy, I was completely on board. I'd read Sherwin Nuland's "How We Die," Atul Gawande's "Being Mortal," Elisabeth Kubler-Ross's "On Death and Dying." Comfort would be the priority and any pain would be "managed," which I assumed meant erased.

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https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/whats-a-good-death-its-not-quite-the-peaceful-drifting-off-id-imagined-for-my-dad/2019/09/27/f754c4cc-cf35-11e9-87fa-8501a456c003_story.html?