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| Preface | |
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| Prologue: End-of-Life Issues Are Not New for Me | |
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| Get Ready Now For the Great Beyond | |
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| Death Is Inevitable: So Be Prepared | |
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| A Good Death: There's More Than One Right Way to Die | |
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| Accepting the Patient's Terms | |
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| When the Patient Is Prepared | |
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| When Death Is Sudden | |
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| Help from an Advance Directive | |
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| Even a Good Death Can Sting | |
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| What Most Patients and Families Want | |
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| Advance Directives: A Living Will Is Not Enough | |
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| But Will Your Living Will Help? | |
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| Do You Really Mean "Do Not Resuscitate"? | |
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| An Improved Living Will | |
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| Box: Medical Living Will with Code Status Advance Directive | |
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| You Must Assign a Health Care Proxy | |
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| When Someone Refuses to Create an Advance Directive | |
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| Funeral? Memorial? Why Plan Ahead for the End | |
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| Controlling the Costs | |
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| Warning: An Advance Purchase Can Backfire | |
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| Box: Back-to-Nature Burials | |
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| Planning a Service | |
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| Charting a Course to the End of Life | |
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| Uncertain Future: Living with a Bad Prognosis | |
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| Tell Me, Doc, How Much Time Have I Got? | |
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| The Value of Knowing Time Is Short | |
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| Talking the Talk | |
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| Doctors Need Help, Too | |
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| Coma: When the Brain Is on Hold | |
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| Common Causes of Coma | |
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| A Confusion of States | |
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| Living Well to the End: Where and How | |
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| Do You Really Want to Die at Home? | |
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| What IS Important? Control of Symptoms | |
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| Is There a Role for Feeding Tubes? | |
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| When Treatment Is Futile | |
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| Withholding and Withdrawing Life Support | |
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| When Someone Is Actively Dying | |
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| Caregiving: Tending Someone at the End of Life | |
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| A Rewarding Experience | |
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| A Demanding Job | |
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| Relieving Symptoms | |
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| Managing Pain | |
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| Getting the Help You Need | |
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| Caring for the Caregiver | |
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| How to Know and What to do When the End Is Near | |
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| Respect Wishes for Privacy or Company | |
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| Hospice and Palliative Care: Don't Wait Until It's Too Late | |
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| An Underused Resource | |
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| How Hospice Can Help | |
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| Many Wait Too Long to Enroll | |
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| Hospice Provides Palliative Care | |
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| Sources of Hospice Care | |
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| Box: A Hospice Doctor Finds Joy | |
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| Spiritual Care: Lighten and Enlighten an End-of-Life Journey | |
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| Spirituality Versus Religiosity | |
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| Prepare Yourself Spiritually | |
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| What Family and Friends Can Do | |
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| What Doctors Can Do | |
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| When a Child Is Dying: Surviving the Nightmare | |
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| Children Need and Deserve Comfort Care | |
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| Parents Can Help . . . and Need Help | |
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| What Parents Want from Doctors | |
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| Box: A Mother Recalls Her Baby's Last Day | |
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| Needs of a Dying Child | |
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| Easing the End of a Child's Life | |
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| When a Child Dies Suddenly | |
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| Continuing Care After a Child Dies | |
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| What to Say: Conversations at the End of Life | |
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| Silence Is Not Golden | |
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| Create a Conducive Atmosphere | |
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| Gird Your Loins for Strong Feelings | |
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| What Is-and Is Not-Okay to Say | |
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| Doctors, Too, Must Know What to Say | |
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| Box: Improving Doctor-Patient Communication | |
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| What Patients and Families Want and Need | |
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| Box: Communicating with Hope | |
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| Doctors Who Disappear: What Can Be Done About It | |
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| An All-Too-Common Experience | |
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| Why This Happens | |
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| What Patients and Families Can Do | |
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| Training Compassionate Doctors | |
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| Assisted Dying: What to Consider When Illness Is Unbearable | |
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| Clarifying the Terms | |
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| Weighing the Options | |
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| Opting for a Patient-Controlled Death | |
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| Box: The Oregon Death with Dignity Act | |
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| Considerations if You or a Loved One Seeks a Hastened Death | |
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| Box: If You Are a Physician | |
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| Grief: It's Not a Disease | |
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| No "Right Way" to Grieve | |
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| Anticipatory Grief | |
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| Common Symptoms of Grief | |
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| What Many Find Helpful | |
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| When Grief Is "Complicated" | |
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| Can a Support Group Help? | |
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| Preserving Memories | |
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| What to Say When Someone Dies | |
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| What you Can Do to Help the Bereaved | |
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| Life After Death: What You Leave Behind Counts | |
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| Organ and Body Donations: A Gift of Life | |
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| A Need Unmet | |
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| Misconceptions Abound | |
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| Donation Following Cardiac Death | |
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| Age and Health Are Not Limiting Factors | |
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| Whole Body Donation | |
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| Box: Your Wishes About Organ and Tissue Donation | |
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| Autopsy: Valuable Lessons from the Dead | |
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| A Difficult Decision | |
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| Many Benefits of Autopsy | |
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| Lasting Legacies: Leave Memories and Life Lessons | |
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| Legacies to Treasure | |
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| Overcome Your Resistance | |
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| Epilogue: From the Start Consider the Finish | |
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| Acknowledgments | |
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| Index | |
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| Illustration and Permission Credits | |