Young Physicians Choose Less Intervention at End of Life, Too

We’ve written on this blog before that physicians choose a different kind of death from many of their patients — one with less medical intervention and more palliative care. A survey reported by The New York Times’ health blogger Paula Span reveals these views are held not just by older physicians but by younger ones as well.

“Doctors see a lot,” Dr. Periyakoil told me later that day. Resuscitation attempts are so aggressive — likely to break an older patient’s ribs but unlikely to restore them to their previous state of health or function — that after witnessing several, “you know too much and you’re much more wary,” she said.

Opinions varied slightly between gender, ethnicity, and specialty, but the consensus was the same: Most physicians (88.3 percent of those surveyed) said they would forgo resuscitation efforts and heroic measures if diagnosed with a terminal illness. Read more at The New Old Age blog.