Medicine has triumphed in modern times, transforming birth, injury, and infectious disease from harrowing to manageable. But in the inevitable condition of aging and death, the goals of medicine seem too frequently to run counter to the interest of the human spirit. Nursing homes, preoccupied with safety, pin patients into railed beds and wheelchairs. Hospitals isolate the dying, checking for vital signs long after the goals of cure have become moot....

A palliative care physician draws on stories from her own practice to explain how to enable a gentle and peaceful death and how modern medicine, augmented by traditional palliative approaches, can restore dignity, humanity, and meaning to the end of life.

"The first ever practical, compassionate, and comprehensive guide to dying--and living fully until you do. "There is nothing wrong with you for dying," palliative care doctor BJ Miller and Shoshana Berger write in A Beginner's Guide to the End. "Our ultimate purpose here isn't so much to help you die as it is to free up as much life as possible until you do." Theirs is a clear-eyed and big-hearted action plan for approaching the end of life, written...

"In Life After the Diagnosis, Dr. Steven Z. Pantilat, a renowned international expert in palliative care, shares innovative approaches for dealing with serious illness, outlines the steps that patients should take, and demystifies the medical system. He makes sense of what doctors say, what they actually mean, and how to get the best information to help make the best medical decisions. Dr. Pantilat covers everything from the first steps after the...

Sixteen-year-old Barney has only fleeting memories about his past but, as a voluntary patient at the institute for experimental medicine, he knows he is different from the terminally ill patients surrounding him. His involvement with the bitter, slowly dying, Mazzo brings Barney hope, pain, and a moment of heroic glory.