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end of life

STAT’s coverage on the end of life touches on patients, clinicians, and the medical system as a whole. Stories and perspective pieces explore difficult questions: What should medical care — whether it’s delivered in a hospital, at a nursing facility, or at home — look like at the end of life? How should doctors approach end-of-life conversations? STAT’s coverage also tells personal stories of those with cancer, Alzheimer’s, or other diseases.

Most Read

Endnotes Bob Tedeschi

When a patient nears the end, a feared therapy can also comfort

Health Bob Tedeschi

Make a wish: The top 5 requests from children and adults facing the end of life

Health Bob Tedeschi

Can sheer willpower keep patients alive in their dying hours?

Health Associated Press

‘What could help me to die?’ Doctors clash over euthanasia

First Opinion Jay Baruch

When death is imminent, end-of-life care decisions sometimes go out the window

First Opinion Robert Truog

New guidelines on severe brain injury complicate already difficult decisions

First Opinion Renata Louwers

The cancer stories no one wants to hear

Health Bob Tedeschi

Doctors want to give their cancer patients every chance. But are they pushing off hard talks too long?

All Coverage

First Opinion Podcast Patrick Skerrett

Listen: The faces of Covid at 1 million deaths and counting

First Opinion Shoshana Ungerleider

One million reasons to reimagine end-of-life care

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First Opinion Podcast Patrick Skerrett

Listen: Covid turned the nation’s eyes to nursing homes. Have we already looked away?

First Opinion Krista Lyn Harrison, Meredith Greene and Anthony Galanos

We all need help working through grief and hardship

First Opinion Podcast Patrick Skerrett

Listen: A physician and philosopher on the dangers of ‘curating’ natural deaths and executions

First Opinion Joel B. Zivot and Ira Bedzow

What the death rattle and capital punishment have in common

First Opinion Elizabeth Tracey

‘This Is My Story’: connecting clinicians with hospitalized patients who can’t speak for themselves

First Opinion Hannah Wunsch

That ‘damn machine’: the dark side of mechanical ventilators in the ICU

First Opinion Haider J. Warraich

For-profit nursing homes and hospices are a bad deal for older Americans

Health Alissa Ambrose

Picturing the ‘patience, love, and devotion’ of Alzheimer’s care

First Opinion L.S. Dugdale

Rethinking Black Friday to include end-of-life conversations

First Opinion Ravi Parikh, Christopher Manz and Mitesh Patel

A nudge helps doctors bring up end-of-life issues with their dying cancer patients

First Opinion Charlotte Grinberg

It should be easy for people to receive end-of-life care at home. Why is it so hard?

Health Eric Boodman

She’s spent decades caring for dying patients. When her mom’s time came, Covid-19 kept them apart

First Opinion Richard E. Leiter

Palliative care needs tweaking in the coronavirus era

Health Eric Boodman

A cancer patient reconsiders her end-of-life wishes, as Covid-19 brings mortality into sharper focus

First Opinion Anna Gosline

The right words matter when talking about advance directives

First Opinion Angelo Volandes, Aretha Delight Davis and Ira Byock

While social distancing, do your other patriotic duty: have The Conversation about serious illness care

First Opinion Aimee Gindin

A daughter’s plea: Doctors must stop shirking palliative care

First Opinion Mackenzie Graham, Adrian M. Owen and Charles Weijer

Armchair philosophizing doesn’t help conscious patients in vegetative states

First Opinion Jacob M. Appel

Some people in persistent vegetative states have working minds. Does keeping them in limbo amount to torture?

First Opinion Sarah H. Cross and Haider J. Warraich

More Americans are dying at home. Is that a good thing?

First Opinion Ira Byock and Eric Walsh

Hopewell House hospice has closed. You should care about that

First Opinion Adam Philip Stern

‘The most peaceful sleep’: Cancer is nudging me to picture dying in a new way

First Opinion Colleen M. Farrell

As a doctor in the ICU, I sometimes feel helpless. Poetry provides solace