Resources

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Resources

Patient Advocacy

10 Patient Rights in America’s Healthcare System. From Privacy to Medical Rights in America’s Healthcare System by Trisha Torrey Link to Article

The Role of a Patient Advocate from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Link to article

How to be your own health care advocate. Resources from the Joint Commission’s Take Charge Campaign. Link to Article

NPR’s Fresh Air interview with end-of-life doula Alua Arthur who says “life is more meaningful if you ‘get real’ about the end”. Link

End-of-Life Doulas are Changing the Conversation Around How We Die. PBS Independent Lens   Link

National End of LIfe Doula Association  Link

Caring Conversations Workbook from Center for Practical Bioethics   Link

Hospice and Palliative Care  End-of-Life Information and Resources from the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization. Link

The Life File from the folks at Death with Dignity   Link

Medical Aid in Dying

Rethinking Medical Aid in Dying: What Does It Mean to ‘Do No Harm?’Dallas R. Lawry, DNP, FNP-C, AOCN  Link

Death with Dignity   link

Funeral Consumers Alliance National   Link

Funeral Consumers Alliance National   of Western Mass  link

The Inspired Funeral  Link

Home funerals are an option. National Home Funeral Alliance

Link

Green Burial Council   Link

State of Massachusetts Issues to Consider in Preparing for Disposition of Decedents

Link

A plethora of resources that look at grief from Re-Imagine   Link

 

The Order of the Good Death, home base of the Death Positive Movement and its founder mortician, writer, podcaster, and advocate for funeral industry reform – Caitlin DoughtyLink

ReImagine  Let’s Reimagine loss, adversity, and mortality, and channel life’s challenges into meaning and growth.

Link

Favorites

Books, Movies, Podcasts, and More

Books

The American Way of Death Revisited by Jessica Mitford   

The Art of Dying Well by Katy Butler

http://www.katybutler.com/author/the-art-of-dying-well/

Being Mortal. Medicine and What Matters Most in the End by Atul Gawande   Link

A Beginner’s Guide to the End    BJ Miller  and Shoshana Berger

Link

Being with Dying by Joan Halifax

A Dignified Ending  Taking Control Over How We Die by Lewis Mitchel Cohen

Final Gifts: Understanding the Special Awareness, Needs, and Communications of the Dying by Maggie Callanan & Patricia Kelley

 

The Five Invitations by Frank Ostaseski  Link

Natural Causes by Barbara Ehrenreich

Smoke Gets in Your Eyes: And Other Lessons from the Crematory by Caitlin Doughty

The End Game. Facing an inevitable outcome, terminally ill patients meet extraordinary medical practitioners seeking to change our approach to life and death.  Available on Netflix

Coco, a 2017 Pixar production inspired by the Mexican Holiday; Día de Muertos.  Available on Netflix.

Extremis. A powerful documentary exploring end-of-life decision making in a hospital setting. This short documentary examines how medical teams communicate with one other and families about end-of-life decisions and the crucial choices they must make. Available on Netflix. 

Being Mortal Frontline PBS Documentary based on Atul Gawande’s book. Link

Tuesdays with Morrie.  Available on YouTube

Ask the Mortician. Caitlin Doughty’s You Tube Channel. A new perspective of the funeral industry. Link

End of Life University. Real talk about life and death. Link

The Grave Woman.  Joél Simone Anthony is a licensed funeral director and sacred grief practitioner in Atlanta, Georgia. 

Link

Everyone Dies is a nonprofit organization with the goal to educate the public about the processes associated with dying and death, empower regarding options and evidence-based information to help them guide their care, normalize dying, and reinforce that even though everyone dies, first we live, and that every day we are alive is a gift. Link