Engage With Grace

I'm happy to pass along a link to the Engage With Grace website, which is trying to get families to talk about end-of-life decisions when they gather during the Thanksgiving holiday. An article in the Boston Globe gives more information about the project. I can tell you from personal experience that these types of conversations don't have to be depressing affairs - they can generate a lot of lively discussion that, at least with my boys, was pretty entertaining. I suppose it's a lot easier to talk about these matters before they become pressing.



I learned about this from my own blawg mentor, Bob Coffield, who operates the best health care blog in the state, and one of the most informative in the country. Check out the hyperlink, he's worth visiting. Here's what he wrote:

Last month I had the opportunity at the Health 2.0 Conference in San Francisco to watch Alexandra Drane announce the Engage With Grace: The One Slide Project. The idea behind the project is to get people to share just ONE slide that helps them and their loved ones talk about having a purposeful end-of-life experience. Alexandra's talk personally touched me because my family went through a similar experience 30 years ago when I was 12 and my mother died at home with cancer in 1978. She had the opportunity to die at home surrounded by her 5 children because both my dad and uncle were her doctors. In the past and today, not all families are given this important choice. The memories I have of my mother's final days 30 years ago are still important to me today. As a health care lawyer who has been involved in the legal aspects of end of life decisions expressing your wishes, knowing the wishes of those who you love and legally documenting them are important.