Tag: ethics

Mercy

Through beautiful description and comparison Selzer writes about an interaction between a patient, his doctor, and his family at the end of his life. In the story, the patient is in the hospital, suffering and in pain. This piece serves as the doctor’s narrative, as he, too, suffers in deciding how to ease his patient’s pain, which can only be done by euthanasia. The doctor deliberates back and forth about the options and ultimately gives the patient what should be a fatal dose of morphine, yet still, he does not die. This piece raises questions about medical ethics, listening to patients, listening to families, and making informed decisions in healthcare.

This narrative could be used in courses regarding medical ethics, death, medicine, and narrative medicine. This piece could prompt discussion about medical ethics, who gets to make choices, and why certain choices are made in healthcare. It can be used to show the place of creative writing in medicine, as it provides a creative account of an interaction between a doctor and a patient.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

This book is a biography of Henrietta Lack, a black woman who died of cervical cancer in 1951. Before her death, Henrietta Lacks’ cells were harvested from her cervical tumor without her knowledge or consent. The HeLa cell line originates from these cancerous cervical cells, and it is the cell line most used for any study on human cells. Neither Henrietta nor her family were consulted nor informed about the mass distribution and use of her cells until decades later when her cells were already the cause of many medical discoveries and breakthroughs. This book was the first to paint the whole picture of the human behind the most famous cell line.

This book might be used in courses on research and medical ethics, on health (in)equities, or on narrative medicine. For example, it sheds light on all of the factors, both medical and societal, that led to a lack of adequate or ethical care. Her story shows the importance of health stories for humanizing medicine. It allows for reflection on the history of healthcare as it relates to women and people of color (specifically black people and black women).

Familia conoce a mujer que recibió corazón de hija con VIH

Shaffrey describes the life of a woman, Brittany Newton, who suffered from a heroin addiction and died when she was 30 years old. She was also HIV-positive–for many years, doctors have transplanted organs from one HIV-positive person to another. This happened in the case of Brittany’s donated heart, and Brittany’s family was able to hear her heart beating in Maria’s, the transplant recipient’s, chest. 5 minute read, appropriate for upper intermediate Spanish learners.

It’s the ‘life’ in end-of-life that matters

Prompted by Atul Gawande’s New Yorker essay (“Letting Go,” which addresses similar themes as his book, Being Mortal), the author reflects on two experiences he had as a resident in the NICU, one in which all possible medical treatment was pursued inappropriately and another in which extra-ordinary measures were not applied so that a family could spend a final day with a fatally ill newborn. The author blames the broader medical system, and says his frustrations with that system led him to his current occupation as a health services researcher.

In contrast to end-of-life stories that involve elderly patients or terminally ill adults, this blog post provides vivid examples of NICU treatment decision-making.