Reply to Bias towards elderly who will not go quietly

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[quote=Anonymous]My mid-80s parents have always made it clear that they want to live for as long as possible, damn the torpedoes.

Do they want CPR? Yes.
Do they want risky surgeries? Yes.
Will they fill out an advance directive of some kind? No they will not! They want to be full code, forever.

This is an informed choice they are making. (Probably not the choice I would make, but I dunno, ask me in another three decades!)

But I feel like hospital staff frequently do not really approve of this and don’t treat them the same way they would treat, say, *me* if I were in their various medical situations.

My parents look truly ancient. They are not in good health but soldier on through sheer force of will. Doctors who have just met them look at them and probably think, “they’re in progressive decline, we can do this thing and it may not work and if it did, it would only delay the inevitable by a few months at best.” My parents’ attitude is, why would I forgo a few months of my only earthly existence?! If all they can do is eat some ice cream and look at some birds, they want to do it as long as possible. It does put burdens on other people and I sense a certain amount of resentment of that in the medical field who just want them to go to hospice already.

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