Search Results for: advance care planning

How are you planning to mark this Saturday, April 16th, which is National Healthcare Decisions Day? Maybe grab your best friends or your closest loved ones and have a really good heart-to-heart about what matters and what you fear the most? Good communication and heartfelt conversation are the foundation for…

In the early months of the pandemic, especially when it became clear that older adults were at high risk of serious illness or even death from COVID, there was the hope that advance care planning (documenting your wishes regarding end-of-life care and appointing a health care proxy to speak on…

Palliative care specialist Rachel Clarke, writing in The Guardian, perhaps sums up this moment better than anyone else: “Whether we like it or not, society’s greatest taboo- death and dying- has been thrust unequivocally centre stage.” Indeed, virtually none of us will escape the reality that loved ones, friends or…

No matter how often you’re told that planning in advance for serious illness is essential for you, your family and your health care team, so many of us still refuse to fill out forms or partake in conversations. And as our society continues to age, such advance care planning just…

By Susanna P. Barton   Make no bones about it, pets make us happier, healthier humans – throughout life and especially during our second half.  A recent report from the American Psychiatric Association shows 86% of participants believe pets have a mostly positive impact on their mental health.  A 2019…

By Susanna P. Barton   The medical world is all about shades of grey and paperwork, a truth that makes go-time decision-making confusing and stressful for us and our loved ones. Let’s stop doing that and start aligning our advance care planning and healthcare decisions before crisis rules the day….