Book Review

Medical anthropologist Sharon M . Kaufman , author of And a Time to sound : How Ameri give the gate Hospitals shape the End of Life says that however within the last few hundred years has demise establish a medical c oncern Previously , tribe looked upon wipeout as a private personal rite of passing play that took place within the confines of the dwelling house plate and surrounded by one s loved ones a spiritual journey . indeed there enters the medical professional , who takes pro retentiveing vitality or delaying destruction as a mission and anxious(p) is transformed into a last gasp for hope , a medical hardship It gets worse . Only within the last half-century has the number of state who daunt in hospitals come to vastly outnumber that of those destruction at home . Recent scientific research has only served to broaden and much very much blur the definition of last and life . Death as a personal get word has pretty much been erased and instead has become an worldal incubus , one contorted by hospital politics bureaucratic logic without logical purpose , and the law . Kaufman exposes , with all its complexities , the brushwood of dying(p) patients and their families with the only institutional resources available to themOne of the ideas I theory was important was the experience of dying and Kubler-Ross (69-70 . From my studies I fall in imbed that many observers own found fault with Kubler-Ross s model of dying . I tend to believe in her models and just the like any model it gives a good ideal of what individuals go through but the isn t set in stone . or so of the criticism has focused on her methodology . From my understanding she canvas only a comparatively minute sample of people and provided little information about how they were selected and provided little information about how they were selected and how often they were interviewed . Also all her patients were suffering from cancer , needing(a) some to wonder whether her model is universal , noting that dissentent cultures have very different ways of thinking about devastation . Death itself is universal , but reactions to dying may differ greatly from one culture to anotherHospital culture and its relation to stopping point and dying have been discussed widely and just from my own family experiences , I have k this instantn Americans to slowly come to the belief that the gray argon to die in a care knack or hospital . This trend was a somewhat degenerate heathenish change for the United States . Not too long ago the dying process was usually at home with loved one caring for the person . It is not dispute that dying people like other people lead self-confidence security and dignity . They may need ease from pain and a medical controversy is discussed very openly concerning giving them addictive pain-killers , like narcotics , that are unavailable to the worldwide public . I believe that the dignity and pain of dying people should take precedence over broader political issues . It is plummy for medical staff to anticipate and prevent extremes of pain sooner than only respond to patient s request . Another institution and an alternative to hospital or health care facilities mentioned in the book a couple of times in regards to ending and dying is HospiceHospice has come to refer to homelike environments in which terminally ill people can face goal with sensible and emotional supports that provide dignity . In contrast to hospitals , hospices do not restrict visiting hours . Family and friends work with specially deft staff to provide support . In contrast to hospitals procedures , patients are given as much control over their lives as they can handle . So long as their somatogenetic conditions permit , patients are encouraged to make decisions as to their diets , activities and music and this also includes a cocktail that contains sugar , narcotics , alcohol and a antianxiety agent . The cocktail is intended to reduce pain and anxiety without clouding cognitive functioning , although this goal cannot be perfectly met . Relatives and friends may fight contact with staff to work through their grief once the patient has died (141 , 132 , and 145 last was another important concept of the book . Culture dictates the words that are spoken and rituals performed at all milestones in life , from birth to marriage to death . For example in the Irish culture when someone has died it is customary to hold what is called a wake for watch over the deceased person , before the sepulcher . The wake may be accompanied by excesses in food , alcohol and festivities . And in the Jewish culture the deceased is buried quickly usually within one twenty-four hour period of death , and the immediate family follows strict rules for mourning and self-denial for a week .

Both processes represent cultural mechanisms for adjusting to the emotional impairment of the loss of a family member . It is not strange or crazy for people of Irish heritage to behave as they do at a wake it is behavior that can best be understood in terms of its cultural context In most human societies people have , in effect , two types of death one biological and the other social . Between these two there is a variable period of time , which may be years , months or even years . While biological death is the end of the human organism , social death is the end of the person s social identity (318In Western industrialized corporation , death , like birth is increasingly medicalized , and is more in all probability now to take place in hospitals than at home . The natural stages of biological dying are now often seen as being , in some ways , touched or even pathological . In many much(prenominal) societies , the concept of death by natural causes has almost disappeared . In the USA , according to Kaufman a death in hospitals is now considered to be a socio-medical failure . Sometimes this may lead to the bereaved family blaming the death on the supposed incompetence of the physicians , instead than on old age or severe distemper . Another assertion is the growing emphasis on the measuring rod of life expectancy rather than the quality , especially where resuscitation involves epical , aggressive , and uncomfortable and painful forms of treatmentUltimately , death must be viewed as a part of life , everything that has ever lived , or leave behind live , will one day die . Thinking about this unpleasant reality of life does not necessarily make the prospect of death any more pleasant or acceptable . Still , the reality that death is a natural part of life may be useful in some way , however small , if it helps keep us on track and productive during the relatively brief time we have on this earth . In this context , I think of Erik Erikson Erikson (1963 ) viewed the period of late matureness as a time of reflection on how significant and how full life has been . Life for most of us will continue assorted triumphs and failures . For Erikson , key to adjustment in this after period of life is how people view their lives on counterbalance . Was it full ? Empty ? Meaningful ? MeaninglessReferenceKaufman , S . R (2006 . And a time to die : How American hospitals Shape the end of life . Chicago : University of Chicago PressPAGEPAGE 4 ...If you want to get a full essay, order it on our website: Ordercustompaper.com

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