Choices at the End of Life: Finding Out What Your Parents Want Before It's Too Late

"Perhaps most important, we will provide tips on how to talk about the things that matter most to your parents. What do they value? Who is important to them? What do they want their lives to be like as they approach the final stretch of the road? If you understand the answers to these questions, you will better understand the choices they make about their healthcare." ~Linda Northlander and Kerstin McSteen Linda Northlander and Kerstin McSteen deal with the very sensitive issue of discussing death and life-support treatments with your parents. Through this book, you can learn a great deal about medical terminology and the pros and cons of feeding tubes and orders like DNR and DNI, but may or may not be what your parents want. So, this book helps you and your parents decide what is best. The chapters in this book include: Planning a Discussion Who's Who in Advance Care Planning Healthcare Options Opening the Discussion Understanding Values and Goals Assessing Decision-Making Ability How to Talk with the Doctor Completing a Healthcare Directive Understanding Hospice Care Kitchen Table Calamities Grief support, hospice care and issues with honoring directives are also discussed. This book will be appreciated by caregivers and by the person who knows they will need to be making many of the main decisions in regards to healthcare for an elderly relative. While difficult to read about death, it does bring an understanding to the healthcare issues everyone faces at the end of life. You may also want to read this book if you are working on a Living Will/Advance Directive. The last time I was in a hospital one of the first things the nurse asked me was if I had a Living Will, so this book may be useful for more than end of life issues. ~The Rebecca Review

As a physician working in the palliative and hospice care arena, 'Choices' is a welcome resource and guidebook for facilitating conversations on what people want at the end of life. This book provides excellent background on why these 'kitchen table discussions' need to take place, and, more importantly, how to engage loved ones in these conversations. The examples are real and I believe many readers will be able to identify and relate to them. In addition, there are numerous resources listed at the back of the book, so that obtaining appropriate forms for documenting your parent's wishes will not be an impediment. Our elders talk about this topic among themselves frequently. Now is the time to bring those conversations out into the open.If this practical book isn't enough to get people started, I'd like to see Norlander and McSteen take the next step and organize community workshops whereby participants can practice the converstations and become even more comfortable raising these issues with their parents and relatives. Thank you Ms. Norlander and Ms. McSteen

Linda Norlander has given my family a wonderful gift. Her book served as the catalyst for a candid family discussion that, given current medical technology, I strongly feel all children and parents should have. Highly recommended.

The book is a remarkably lucid explanation of why and how you should discuss the end of life with family members. It is a combination of practical "how to" and "what is" information about the kinds of choices that have to be made with terminal illness with examples of how real people have faced these choices. It is written with a somewhat wry humor and great compassion, from the experience of the authors, who work in the hospice movement, their own families and friends. Based on the notion that difficult, personal issues should be discussed over a kitchen table (or wherever everyone is most comfortable), it is essential reading for anyone who has older parents or who themselves will become old (which means pretty much everyone who is an adult). Highly recommended.