Palliative care is an interdisciplinary medical caregiving approach aimed at optimizing quality of life and mitigating suffering among people with serious, complex, and often terminal illnesses. Within the published literature, many definitions of palliative care exist. The World Health Organization (WHO) describes palliative care as "an approach that improves the quality of life of patients and their families facing the problems associated with life-threatening illness, through the prevention and relief of suffering by means of early identification and impeccable assessment and treatment of pain and other problems, physical, psychosocial, and spiritual." In the past, palliative care was a disease specific approach, but today the WHO takes a broader approach, that the principles of palliative care should be applied as early as possible to any chronic and ultimately fatal illness.
Thanatology is the scientific study of death and the losses brought about as a result. It investigates the mechanisms and forensic aspects of death, such as bodily changes that accompany death and the postmortem period, as well as wider psychological and social aspects related to death. It is primarily an interdisciplinary study offered as a course of study at numerous colleges and universities.
Sutter Health California Pacific Medical Center (CPMC) is a general medical/surgical and teaching hospital in San Francisco, California. It was created by a merger of some of the city's longest established hospitals and currently operates three acute care campuses.
Ira Robert Byock is an American physician, author, and advocate for palliative care. He is founder and chief medical officer of the Providence St. Joseph Health Institute for Human Caring in Torrance, California, and holds appointments as active emeritus professor of medicine and professor of community health and family medicine at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth College. He was director of palliative medicine at Dartmouth–Hitchcock Medical Center, from 2003–14, and associate director for patient and family-centered care at the affiliated Norris-Cotton Cancer Center.
David Samuel Gottesman was a Hungarian-born, American pulp-paper merchant, financier and philanthropist. He was generally known as Samuel Gottesman or D. Samuel Gottesman.
Dignity Health was a California-based not-for-profit public-benefit corporation that operates hospitals and ancillary care facilities in three states. Dignity Health was the fifth-largest hospital system in the nation and the largest not-for-profit hospital provider in California.
End-of-life care refers to health care provided in the time leading up to a person's death. End-of-life care can be provided in the hours, days, or months before a person dies and encompasses care and support for a person's mental and emotional needs, physical comfort, spiritual needs, and practical tasks.
Sutter Health is a not-for-profit integrated health delivery system headquartered in Sacramento, California. It operates 24 acute care hospitals and over 200 clinics in Northern California.
In the United States, hospice care is a type and philosophy of end-of-life care which focuses on the palliation of a terminally ill patient's symptoms. These symptoms can be physical, emotional, spiritual or social in nature. The concept of hospice as a place to treat the incurably ill has been evolving since the 11th century. Hospice care was introduced to the United States in the 1970s in response to the work of Cicely Saunders in the United Kingdom. This part of health care has expanded as people face a variety of issues with terminal illness. In the United States, it is distinguished by extensive use of volunteers and a greater emphasis on the patient's psychological needs in coming to terms with dying.
Hospice care is a type of health care that focuses on the palliation of a terminally ill patient's pain and symptoms and attending to their emotional and spiritual needs at the end of life. Hospice care prioritizes comfort and quality of life by reducing pain and suffering. Hospice care provides an alternative to therapies focused on life-prolonging measures that may be arduous, likely to cause more symptoms, or are not aligned with a person's goals.
Alameda Health System (AHS), formerly Alameda County Medical Center (ACMC), is an integrated public health care system organized as a public hospital authority.
The Order of the Good Death is a death acceptance organization founded in 2011 by mortician and author Caitlin Doughty. The group advocates for natural burial and embracing human mortality.
Steven Ungerleider was an American sports psychologist, author, and documentary film producer.
Extremis is a 2016 American short documentary that follows Dr. Jessica Zitter, an ICU and palliative care specialist who leads a team in the Highland Hospital ICU in Oakland, California. She helps families make end-of-life decisions for their loved ones, who are often terminally ill and or on life support. It is directed and produced by Dan Krauss. It was shot at an intensive care unit at Highland Hospital in Oakland, California. The film was funded, in part, by physician and end of life advocate, Dr. Shoshana R. Ungerleider. There are five patients shown in the documentary; however, it only focuses on three patients.
End Game is a 2018 American short documentary film by Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman about terminally ill patients in a San Francisco hospital meeting medical practitioners seeking to change the perception around life and death. The film was executive produced by Steven Ungerleider and Shoshana R. Ungerleider. It was released by Netflix.
BJ Miller is an American physician, author, and speaker. He is a practicing hospice and palliative medicine physician and is best known for his 2015 TED Talk, "What Really Matters at the End of Life" BJ has been on the teaching faculty at UCSF School of Medicine since 2007. He sees patients and caregivers through his online palliative care service, Mettle Health.
1Life Healthcare, Inc. is a San Francisco-based chain of primary healthcare clinics. One Medical is a membership-based primary care service with in-person care and online resources, including a mobile app. In February 2023, it was acquired by Amazon.
Syra Madad is an American pathogen preparedness expert and infectious disease epidemiologist. Madad is the Senior Director of the System-wide Special Pathogens Program at NYC Health + Hospitals where she is part of the executive leadership team which oversees New York City's response to the Coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic in the city's 11 public hospitals. She was featured in the Netflix documentary series Pandemic: How to Prevent an Outbreak and the Discovery Channel documentary The Vaccine: Conquering COVID.
Naheed Dosani is a palliative care physician based in Ontario, Canada, who founded and leads the Palliative Education and Care for the Homeless (PEACH) program. For his efforts in providing mobile healthcare to individuals with vulnerable housing or are homeless, Dosani has received a Meritorious Service Cross from the Governor General of Canada (2017), and a Canadian Medical Association Award for Young Leaders (2020).
