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  • Being Mortal

  • Medicine and What Matters in the End
  • By: Atul Gawande
  • Narrated by: Robert Petkoff
  • Length: 9 hrs and 3 mins
  • 4.8 out of 5 stars (13,877 ratings)

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Being Mortal

By: Atul Gawande
Narrated by: Robert Petkoff
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Publisher's summary

Number one New York Times best seller

In Being Mortal, best-selling author Atul Gawande tackles the hardest challenge of his profession: how medicine can not only improve life but also the process of its ending Medicine has triumphed in modern times, transforming birth, injury, and infectious disease from harrowing to manageable. But in the inevitable condition of aging and death, the goals of medicine seem too frequently to run counter to the interest of the human spirit.

Nursing homes, preoccupied with safety, pin patients into railed beds and wheelchairs. Hospitals isolate the dying, checking for vital signs long after the goals of cure have become moot. Doctors, committed to extending life, continue to carry out devastating procedures that in the end extend suffering.

Gawande, a practicing surgeon, addresses his profession's ultimate limitation, arguing that quality of life is the desired goal for patients and families. Gawande offers examples of freer, more socially fulfilling models for assisting the infirm and dependent elderly, and he explores the varieties of hospice care to demonstrate that a person's last weeks or months may be rich and dignified.

Full of eye-opening research and riveting storytelling, Being Mortal shows how the ultimate goal is not a good death but a good life - all the way to the very end.

©2014 Atul Gawande (P)2014 Macmillan Audio

Featured Article: A Future Corpse's Guide to Death Acceptance


Confronting death does not necessitate a spiral into despondency. Instead we may come a realization that, in acknowledging and accepting this fate, we paradoxically lead fuller and more emotionally present lives. In this list, scholars, physicians, journalists, philosophers, and death professionals share their stories, perspectives, and advice, offering a glimpse into how we can prepare for the end with grace, heart, and humor.