This program discusses care at the end of life, primarily focusing on pallative care of individuals and their families. The program's focus is on spiritual and supportive aspects of care rather than physical care. Information on the role and importance of advance care planning and advance directives is also presented.

There is an unspoken dark side of American medicine--keeping patients alive at all costs. Two thirds of Americans die in healthcare institutions tethered to machines and tubes, even though research indicates that most prefer to die at home in comfort, surrounded by loved ones. The question How do you want to live? must be posed to the seriously ill because they deserve to choose. If doctors explain options--including the choice to forego countless...

An advance care plan (ACP) is a legal document that you create to ensure that your wishes for your end of life are made clear and adhered to. An ACP is a good document to have whether you are sick or well. It becomes a crucial document once you are no longer able to express your wishes. In these 'Speaking from experience' video clips, people discuss their experiences of creating an Advance Care Plan, and the benefits of having one in place. They were...

An exquisitely written, expertly reported memoir and expose; of modern medicine that leads the way to more humane, less invasive end-of-life care based on the author's acclaimed New York Times Magazine piece. This is the story of one daughter's struggle to allow her parents the peaceful, natural deaths they wanted and to investigate the larger forces in medicine that stood in the way. When doctors refused to disable the pacemaker that caused her eighty-four-year-old...