Monday, September 15, 2008
More Palliative Medicine Blogs!
So far the world of Hospice and Palliative Medicine related blogs has been slower to grow than emergency room staff or primary care physicians, but we are starting to get a good little community here. Two blogs that should be highlighted are "Dethmama Chronicles: The true adventures of a hospice nurse" and "DNR/DNI" by Leo Levi.
Dethmama Chronicles is written anonymously by a home hospice nurse who works the night shift and responds to crises and death calls. The role of the hospice nurse in this situation can change instantly several times within one visit. She is candid and entertaining in her writing about in-home experiences like being threatened with a knife by a bereaved family member, dealing with intoxicated bereaved family members (in two parts!), and a miscalculated prognosis leading to a new renter in Grandma's old room. She also peppers her posts with Fun-Filled Funereal* Facts and a recurring series of web highlights about hospice issues. There are even some cats and dogs in there if you need some non-palliative medicine material.**
DNR/DNI by Leo Levy, a pseudonym for an anonymous MICU RN who has a knack for palliative care issues. Leo writes in a longer form with stories that have many different components which are occasionally strung along several blog posts. A longer series about a patient Mrs. Hardy was particularly fascinating and I could imagine many palliative care professionals could identify with the story.
If you are interested in reading these blogs regularly consider trying an RSS reader (if you have not already.)
- Hospice Blog by Hospice Guy (July 2004!)
- Bioethics Discussion Blog by Dr. Maurice Bernstein (July 2004!)
- Pallimed by Rosielle, Sinclair, and Quinn (June 2005)
- Hospice and Nursing Homes Blog by Frances Shani Parker (January 2007)
- Reflections by Dr. Bruce Campbell (April 2007)
- Medical Futility by Law Professor Thaddeus Pope (July 2007)
- Hospice Foundation of America Blog edited by Krista Renenger (August 2007)
- DNR/DNI by Leo Levi (April 2008)
- Dethmama Chronicles by Dethmama (June 2008)
Are there other blogs our readers follow that focus on palliative medicine issues as a central theme? Are you going to start a blog?
*I was surprised to find "funereal" is an actual word. Score one for my crossword puzzles.
**Hospice Guy broke the blog to the world first, but I had followed it for a while before that.
6 Responses to “More Palliative Medicine Blogs!”
September 16, 2008
Another interesting site for docs is Sermo, which is rapidly growing and contains threads on current and diverse topics of interest to medicine in general. I have tried to start a palliative medicine category unfortunately without much interest. However there are sometimes discussions of cases that are relevant to palliative medicine and it is interesting to read other docs' reactions and thoughts on these topics(disclaimer: I am not associated in any way with the management of Sermo)
September 16, 2008
I have not jumped in the Sermo pool yet. One has only so many websites to check everyday. I think it would be interesting for our hospice and palliative care to look at how we approach these web 2.0 applications of social networking and how we can use them as effective communication tools.
On a whim I started the Pallimed Facebook group, and without advertising it at all we 10 members, and now we are around 40. People have asked about who is going to certain conferences and if there were any other med students interested in Pallimed, all of which actually surprised me that in such a short time there could be that kind of connectivity.
If palliative care in Sermo starts to grow let us know more. It also makes me wonder if our field should encourage some sort of ambassadorship (informally) to connect with social networks and user generated content.
Like Wikipedia for example. What if for 2 months there was a call to hospice and palliative medicine to descend on Wikipedia and give a good refurbishing to all palliative care related articles? Think about what a contribution that would be to the global community AND possibly help debunk misinformation AND promote positive approaches to living with a terminal illness.
I think that would be cool.
September 17, 2008
Thank you for your support Dr. Sinclair. I really appreciate it.
September 19, 2008
I really do mean to get back to my blog, but w/o a clinical practice right now, preparing for my dissertation proposal defense, and my current obsession with US politics, who knows when it will happen?
September 19, 2008
Marachne,
I was going to mention yours but since it had not been updated in a while, I didn't want to put the pressure on you!
September 23, 2008
This is the first anonymous poster. It seems that Sermo did in fact open up a category for "Hospice / Palliative care"! So far there are about 11 physicians who have identified themselves under this category (in comparison to a total of >80k docs that are plugged in to Sermo). So the number is small but its a start and I hope will continue to grow.
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