Medical Design and Outsourcing

  • Home
  • Medical Device Business
    • Mergers & Acquisitions
    • Financial
    • Regulatory
  • Applications
    • Cardiovascular
    • Devices
    • Imaging
    • Implantables
    • Medical Equipment
    • Orthopedic
    • Surgical
  • Technologies
    • Contract Manufacturing
    • Components
    • Electronics
    • Extrusions
    • Materials
    • Motion Control
    • Prototyping
    • Pumps
    • Tubing
  • Med Tech Resources
    • Subscribe to Print Magazine
    • DeviceTalks Tuesdays
    • Digital Editions
    • eBooks
    • Manufacturer Search
    • Medical Device Handbook
    • MedTech 100 Index
    • Podcasts
    • Print Subscription
    • The Big 100
    • Webinars / Digital Events
    • Whitepapers
    • Video
  • 2022 Leadership in MedTech
    • 2022 Leadership Voting!
    • 2021 Winners
    • 2020 Winners
  • Women in Medtech

They Call Me ‘Dr. Kevorkian’

November 15, 2013 By Jessica Nutik Zitter, M.D.

The patient had a severe pneumonia of advanced AIDS. He’d been lying in our intensive care unit for three weeks, a breathing tube thrust into his raw airway, his face a mixture of pain and resignation. His weakened lung tissue had popped in several areas, requiring chest tubes to drain the pockets of pressurized air. He looked like a sea creature with multiple tentacles.

My co-attending doctor in the I.C.U. had tasked me with keeping the patient alive for the weekend. “I’m going to try and get the tubes out on Monday,” he explained. Knowing the prognosis, I asked him if he’d told the family the patient was going to die.

“No. I can keep him alive for now,” he replied. With that, he left.

Soon after, the patient’s family arrived. I took a deep breath and told them what I knew they hadn’t yet heard: that his lungs had been permanently damaged and were steadily getting worse, and that he would probably never come off the breathing machine. In short, I said, he was dying.

His family took in what I said. I left them in the conference room to process this information, and a short time later his brother found me and asked that the patient be taken off the ventilator and made comfortable. He died peacefully on Sunday night.

I doubted my co-attending doctor would be surprised. My residents tell me some of my colleagues call me Dr. Kevorkian. Specializing in the seemingly divergent fields of intensive care and palliative care, which focuses on the relief of pain and suffering of patients, I frequently find myself in the position of undoing the life-prolonging work of my I.C.U. colleagues.

I believe in letting the dying determine how and when they die, as opposed to coaxing their organs along at all costs. As one of the only doctors I know who straddles these two worlds, I am struck by how many of my colleagues are surprised, even disturbed, by this pairing. I was once accused by a renowned professor of medicine of deceiving my I.C.U. patients by also practicing palliative care, as if it was somehow a conflict of interest.

The I.C.U. is a final common pathway for many of the dying. One in five people in the United States currently dies there, and this number is on the rise. Studies show that many of them suffer significantly before they die.

Continue reading…

Related Articles Read More >

Wire mesh that has captured a blood clot
How an Embotrap stent retriever thrombectomy treats ischemic strokes
A team of doctors use the Hemafuse device to collect and filter a surgery patient's blood
Autotranfusion device maker ships units to Ukraine
A close-up photo of a human eye
Proposed 2023 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule could have a big impact on glaucoma surgeries
Avail Medsystems
How Avail Medsystems seeks to create a connected OR experience

DeviceTalks Weekly.

August 5, 2022
DTW Medtronic's Greg Smith lays out supply chain strategies
See More >

MDO Digital Edition

Digital Edition

Subscribe to Medical Design & Outsourcing. Bookmark, share and interact with the leading medical design engineering magazine today.

MEDTECH 100 INDEX

Medtech 100 logo
Market Summary > Current Price
The MedTech 100 is a financial index calculated using the BIG100 companies covered in Medical Design and Outsourcing.
DeviceTalks

DeviceTalks is a conversation among medical technology leaders. It's events, podcasts, webinars and one-on-one exchanges of ideas & insights.

DeviceTalks

New MedTech Resource

Medical Tubing

Enewsletter Subscriptions

Enewsletter Subscriptions

MassDevice

Mass Device

The Medical Device Business Journal. MassDevice is the leading medical device news business journal telling the stories of the devices that save lives.

Visit Website
MDO ad
Medical Design and Outsourcing
  • MassDevice
  • DeviceTalks
  • MedTech100 Index
  • Medical Tubing + Extrusion
  • Medical Design Sourcing
  • Drug Delivery Business News
  • Drug Discovery & Development
  • Pharmaceutical Processing World
  • R&D World
  • About Us/Contact
  • Advertise With Us
  • Subscribe to Print Magazine
  • Subscribe to E-newsletter
  • Attend our Monthly Webinars
  • Listen to our Weekly Podcasts
  • Join our DeviceTalks Tuesdays Discussion

Copyright © 2022 WTWH Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of WTWH Media LLC. Site Map | Privacy Policy | RSS

Search Medical Design & Outsourcing

  • Home
  • Medical Device Business
    • Mergers & Acquisitions
    • Financial
    • Regulatory
  • Applications
    • Cardiovascular
    • Devices
    • Imaging
    • Implantables
    • Medical Equipment
    • Orthopedic
    • Surgical
  • Technologies
    • Contract Manufacturing
    • Components
    • Electronics
    • Extrusions
    • Materials
    • Motion Control
    • Prototyping
    • Pumps
    • Tubing
  • Med Tech Resources
    • Subscribe to Print Magazine
    • DeviceTalks Tuesdays
    • Digital Editions
    • eBooks
    • Manufacturer Search
    • Medical Device Handbook
    • MedTech 100 Index
    • Podcasts
    • Print Subscription
    • The Big 100
    • Webinars / Digital Events
    • Whitepapers
    • Video
  • 2022 Leadership in MedTech
    • 2022 Leadership Voting!
    • 2021 Winners
    • 2020 Winners
  • Women in Medtech