As the volume of new commentary and information on end of life issues increases it can be hard to step back from the daily flow of material. I’ve always enjoyed the BBC Radio 4 programme ‘Pick of the Week’, so from time to time on the blog I will pick out some of the… Continue reading
Labouring in the fields of academia can so often result in a product that is consumed only by a few like minded folk. So it can be quite a surprise when our efforts resonate widely with a larger community of interest. On 17 March we published our paper on Imminence of death in hospital patients … Continue reading
Some time ago a colleague of mine in Ireland, Eugene Murray, then CEO of the Irish Hospice Foundation, raised the idea of whether it was possible to work out what proportion of people in hospital at any one time are in the last year of life. Knowing the figure, he argued, would assist in advocacy… Continue reading
Terminal illness, dying and death are often difficult words to hear and they can fill a lot of people with fear. Yet mortality is an inescapable part of life. So, why is it that so many of us are afraid to talk about it? This month Marie Curie has published a report, Difficult conversations with… Continue reading
Providing care for people at the end of life is now a pressing humanitarian issue for the 21st century. Yet it is also becoming the focus of divided opinion, conflicting professional standpoints, disagreements about the quality and significance of clinical evidence, and competing models of care delivery. Meanwhile population ageing, changing patterns of mortality and… Continue reading
