“Gripping…A superb resource for boomers dealing with their parents’ final days…as well as for health-care professionals who need to hear this story from the other side.”
--Kirkus Reviews
With advances in medicine, technology, and daily diet and exercise practices, Americans are living longer than ever before. We have an unprecedented opportunity for meaningful closure – free of pain, among loved ones, with our affairs in order and spiritual calm attained. Instead, most of us discover that our doctor has minimal training in providing end-of-life care, and will seek to extend life no matter how painful, expensive and futile that effort might be.
In Last Rights, award-winning journalist Stephen P. Kiernan shows how patients and families can regain control of the dying process, creating familial intimacy like never before. Bolstered by both scientific research and intimate portraits of people from all walks of life, Last Rights offers a hopeful, profound vision for patients, doctors, and families: a way to honor people during their greatest vulnerability, a chance for families to reconnect, an opportunity for the medical system to treat patients with ultimate respect, a time to give comfort and compassion to those we most love.
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
Release Date: 2007-12-10
Customer Review: 5 out of 5
Businesses who afford health care for employees must read this book - There is a great human risk and a huge financial cost to ignoring Kiernan's well-researched, articulate message. We must engage our families, friends and co-workers in this conversation about death; we must honor choices made before the end is upon us. Paying deliberate attention to what we pay for in our health care system at the end of life puts the debate squarely back course - humane, conscientious treatment that could save billions. Make this book required reading for all companies hoping to do right by their employees and their families - if they want to continue offering the benefit. Companies pay the bulk of the health care costs with no say in what's being paid for or why. Palliative end of life care options are the right things to do.
Customer Review: 5 out of 5
An End-of-Life Masterpiece - "Last Rights" is, without a doubt, the best book I've read about end-of-life issues since I joined the hospice movement five years ago. In it, author Stephen Kiernan points out that advances in medical treatments and technology have dramatically changed the way Americans die in the last 30 years - from mostly sudden events to a variety of slow, incremental illnesses. He masterfully weaves both heart-warming and gut-wrenching stories of real-life dying patients and their families along with physician interviews to illustrate the disconnect that often exists between what the terminally ill want/need and what the American medical system tends to do. More importantly, he offers an agenda for change that can empower end-consumers and medical professionals alike. I will be forever grateful to Deb V., a former hospice colleague of mine, who recommended I read this book during a transition from one job to another. I'm glad I did because Mr. Kiernan's words are incredibly insightful and reassuring. You will not be disappointed with this work.
Customer Review: 5 out of 5
Last Rights: Rescuing the End of Life from the Medical System - This book is for anyone who ever wondered if bringing someone home from the hospital to die was the correct decision. This book reinforces that the end of life decisions are only the patient's and the patient's family to make.
Customer Review: 5 out of 5
last things... - most people of mature years are loathe to think of what their final weeks or months are likely to be like. This book puts many of these issues in perspective, and I would put it in the category of "required reading" for everyone over fifty. The author has rich experience of dealing with people who either were reasonably well prepared for their last days, or were not prepared at all. This book can help put you in the right category...
Customer Review: 5 out of 5
Honor Last Rights - Our Mother recently passed away peacefully in the care of Hospice and my Brother. We had opted for Hospice in the final stages of her long and wonderful life. Last Rights gave us so much useful and comforting information during this time. We Highly recommend Last Rights!
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