How Doctors Die 646
Hugh Pickens writes "Dr. Ken Murray, a Clinical Assistant Professor of Family Medicine at USC, writes that doctors don't die like the rest of us. What's unusual about doctors is not how much treatment they get when faced with death themselves, but how little. For all the time they spend fending off the deaths of others, they tend to be fairly serene when faced with death themselves because they know exactly what is going to happen, they know the choices, and they generally have access to any sort of medical care they could want. 'Almost all medical professionals have seen what we call "futile care" being performed on people,' writes Murray. 'What it buys is misery we would not inflict on a terrorist. I cannot count the number of times fellow physicians have told me, in words that vary only slightly, "Promise me if you find me like this that you'll kill me."' Feeding into the problem are unrealistic expectations of what doctors can accomplish. Many people think of CPR as a reliable lifesaver when, in fact, the results are usually poor. If a patient suffers from severe illness, old age, or a terminal disease, the odds of a good outcome from CPR are infinitesimal, while the odds of suffering are overwhelming."
I want to die peacefully in my sleep like my Dad (Score:5, Funny)
But all kidding aside, I agree that the so called "futile care" exists for the patients loved ones and not the patient themselves.
Regenerate? (Score:5, Funny)
I thought Doctors didn't die, they just regenerated? Unless of course they were killed while regenerating.
Re:Regenerate? (Score:5, Funny)
You're thinking of Doctor Who
Sadly, Doctor Who was not a documentary. Despite him being referred to as "the doctor" he is not representative of other doctors
Anonymous - Voice of GOD? (Score:2, Funny)
So Anonymous was right? I should just kill my self now? Everyone told me it was trolling? I feel so empty inside, how could they lie like that. I don't think I'll even go to the rest of my marketing meetings today.
Re:I want to die peacefully in my sleep like my Da (Score:5, Funny)
IT has something similar. Everyone of us has experienced it.
Poor bastard brings in a laptop with that forlorn look on their faces. "Dude... save my porn". You boot up and the drive is not recognized. Take it out, hook it up it for diagnostics and it is dead. No S.M.A.R.T status, nothing. You gently touch the drive and there are no RPMs .
You sit him down, and explain carefully, that the drive is dead. It could have been overheating from leaving the laptop on the bed while going to town with that whole bottle of hand lotion.
There is an outside chance, experimental even, that you could open the drive and transplant it into a working one. The transplant waiting list is not just long, but extremely expensive and not guaranteed. (I had one guy explain to me that the platters looked like an airplane came in for a hard landing and scratched the whole surface deeply).
He leaves laptop in hand, tears freely flowing, and you look to your buddy and tell him, "Dude if I ever lose my porn like that just kill me". Then you remember that you have knowledge and it is protected with ZFS and scrubbing. Thank God.
Re:Ken Murray's blog (Score:5, Funny)