A few days ago we had a chance to talk with Marie, who will enthusiastically tell you that, “I have great conversations with my Lahey doctors.” With a bright smile she adds, “everyone takes the time to listen – really listen.” Then, turning thoughtful she wonders aloud about her  “condition and life prolonging treatments.” As…

Our first Care Professional Community Partner, Kate Granigan, MSW, LICSW, is an experienced advocate in the elder care community, as well as an author whose article Care Providers: Important Members of Your Health Care Team frames the various roles of care providers, explores the various types of care they can provide, and maps the continuum…

Honoring Choices enthusiastically welcomes Medical-Legal Partnership | Boston as a Collaborating Member, working towards our shared mission of improving quality care for all Massachusetts residents. “Honoring Choices exemplifies the kind of proactive, patient-centered support that people deserve,” says Samantha Morton, JD, Executive Director of Medical-Legal Partnership | Boston, adding that “As a program dedicated to detecting,…

TAKE YOUR RIGHTS WITH YOU Moving to a long-term care facility can have a significant impact on a resident’s personal rights and freedoms.  In the words of Rebecca Benson, an experienced advocate for long-term care residents, “When you move to a facility, you take your rights with you.” Attorney Benson shares a few important issues…

One of my friends and colleagues, a teacher and a lawyer whose whole life is about getting people to “open up” to him, when I ask about his end-of-life planning tells me “well, I’ve told each of my daughters more than once that if I don’t wake up some morning,“ I want them to know…

When a member of a faith community is dying the role of clergy is clear. At the end of life clergy is often present, and certainly ministering to the family at such times is an essential presence in faith based lives. However, long before the end of life when congregants are making health care plans,…

Kathy Hankel will tell you, emphatically, that “nurses have a rapport and trust with patients unlike any other in the health profession.” As a nurse and nurse educator, in a career that spans more than thirty years, Kathy has taken part in countless intimate patient conversations, and fully understands the unique role that nurses have…

The Parmenter Foundation, an Honoring Choices Massachusetts Community Partner is excited about its new Advance Care Planning Initiative, as an affirmative means to “improve the honoring of each person’s wishes for care throughout life and at the end of life,” says Cindy Mayher, The Parmenter Foundation’s Executive Director. According to Ms. Mayher they are actively…