Don’t Tell Me When I am Going to Die
By B.J. Miller and Shoshana Berger
NY Times Op-Ed Piece, June 23, 2019
When faced with serious [life-threatening] illness, being able to make decisions about the flow of information is one of the most life-affirming things you can do.
Steve Scheier has created a tool to help you let your physicians and other caregivers know your wished regarding how much information you want to hear. It’s a form called the Prognosis Declaration, and it allows patients to choose among a four options:
- Tell me everything.
- I’ve not decided what I want to know about my prognosis, so ask me over the course of my treatment.
- I want to participate in my treatment, but I don’t want to receive any information on my prognosis.
- I don’t wish to know any information about my prognosis but I authorize you to speak with [blank] about my case and for you to answer any questions that this person may have about my likely prognosis and treatment.
The Prognosis Declaration form is not a vote for denial; it’s simply an acknowledgment that knowing more sometimes serves us less. Because, no matter what we choose, we never really get to know everything.
B.J. Miller, the co-author of this Op-Ed piece, has had an interesting trajectory from student to doctor. Spend three minutes with his “Brief But Spectacular” take on Living and Dying.