First: Twitter delivered a treasure this morning, from @abbrody (Ab Brody, an RN — and PhD — in San Francisco):

Wow,just wow! RT @DianeEMeier Pallimed:Post from husband of Dr. Pardi http://bit.ly/a3TH0X Do not miss this discussion! #hpm #palliative

What’s the big deal? Well, the New York Times ran a piece this week about Dr. Pardi, a palliative care doctor who fought it out against her cancer up to the end. The article was fascinating, disturbing, powerful, and we posted about it—and a related article we’d run in AJN not long ago—at this blog a few days ago.

What Brody’s Twitter message alerts us to today is an ensuing post and discussion at the palliative care blog Pallimed. The discussion has none of the harshness of tone one sometimes gets on Web discussions. Many of the people in the palliative care community seem to know each other, which always helps keep things civil (you don’t typically insult people you’re likely to meet in person).

A big question in the discussion is whether the Times story oversimplified the issues, creating an “either/or”  scenario out of something much more complex, and in the process made palliative care look like it’s all about convincing people to give up and die. But it really gets interesting when Dr. Pardi’s husband pops up in the comments section and attempts to clarify some of the questions and misperceptions raised by the Times story. You’ll […]