Opinion | How to Make Doctors Think About Death

A simple treatment guideline for clinical situations like my octogenarian patient’s might look like this: For patients who have one terminal illness that is either resistant to treatment or can’t be safely treated, combined with a second very serious illness or complication, along with a high degree of physiological frailty, physicians should consider comfort measures instead of cure.

To me, a hospice nurse, this guideline reads like common sense. But doctors who look at patients primarily as collections of individual problems, rather than very sick individuals, can miss the obvious.

Another patient I cared for in the hospital had received a liver transplant, was H.I.V. positive, and had been newly diagnosed with lymphoma. One of his sisters recited his physician’s hope-filled words back to me: “His body isn’t rejecting the liver, his H.I.V. is under control and his lymphoma can be treated.” His mental state had deteriorated to the point that he routinely tried to eat his own feces, but that symptom wasn’t considered relevant.

Health care has many financial incentives that encourage continued treatment, no matter how pointless. Liability issues arise too: Some physicians worry about being sued if they stop aggressive care for dying patients.

But my experience in hospice suggests that the fundamental issue is more basic: lack of time. According to the family of one patient I cared for — 94 years old, septic, minimally conscious, with an intestinal obstruction and a new diagnosis of cancer — no one told them how very ill she was. I would guess the staff didn’t have time, or wasn’t able to make time.

These kinds of discussions take a while because the family’s understanding of the patient’s illness must be sussed out, and their fears, worries and angers must be aired and addressed. “Comfort care” has to be explained in the context of a failing human body. That difficult, time-consuming emotional work can be avoided by simply sending patients to I.C.U. or to another hospital.

Some physicians also believe that they should have the final say about their patients’ care, especially when a patient’s health is failing. Each case is unique, and a physician’s input is invaluable. But doctors are also generally acknowledged to be unrealistically positive prognosticators. The hard truth is that every single one of us will one day reach a point where our irreparable vulnerability, and decline, cannot be denied or reversed.