About this item
A Columbia University physician comes across a popular medieval text on dying well written after the horror of the Black Plague and discovers ancient wisdom for rethinking death and gaining insight today on how we can learn the lost art of dying well in this wise, clear-eyed book that is as compelling and soulful as Being Mortal, When Breath Becomes Air, and Smoke Gets in Your Eyes. As a specialist in both medical ethics and the treatment of older patients, Dr. L. S. Dugdale knows a great deal about the end of life. Far too many of us die poorly, she argues. Our culture has overly medicalized death: dying is often institutional and sterile, prolonged by unnecessary resuscitations and other intrusive interventions. We are not going gently into that good night - our reliance on modern medicine can actually prolong suffering and strip us of our dignity.
About the Author
L.S. Dugdale, MD, MAR, a physician and medical ethicist, is the Dorothy L. and Daniel H. Silberberg Associate Professor of Medicine and Director of the Center for Clinical Medical Ethics at Columbia Vagelos College of Physicians & Surgeons. Prior to her 2019 recruitment to Columbia, she was Associate Director of the Program for Biomedical Ethics and founding Co-Director of the Program for Medicine, Spirituality, and Religion -- both at Yale School of Medicine. A graduate of the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine, Dugdale completed her medical residency at Yale-New Haven Hospital. Her book THE LOST ART OF DYING is written for a broad audience and builds on her earlier academic volume DYING IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY. She lives in NYC with her husband and daughters.
