Learn how honoring the sacredness of birth and death are key to healing the problems in our medical system.
My guest Dr. Nathan Riley specializes in both obstetrics and hospice and palliative care. He’ll share insights from his work at the beginning and the end of life and how the medical system fails to honor the sacredness of these two passages. We will discuss what needs to change in the medical system in order to heal disparities in medicine and honor natural birth and death. Learn more about Nathan’s podcast:
This episode includes:
- How Nathan was inspired by the work of Drs. Paul Farmer and Albert Schweitzer
- Death and birth are equally mysterious and both are often taboo subjects in our society
- Death and birth are both vulnerable times of life and are pathologized and medicalized by the healthcare system
- Reframing death as the beginning of something new and expanded
- The problem with doctors’ focus on “the good outcome” rather than on meeting the needs of the patient in the moment
- What goes wrong during medical training that leads doctors away from the sacredness of medicine
- Slowing down, listening and empathy are essential steps for healing the medical system and improving medical care
- Why doctors fear emotional closeness with patients
- Implicit bias and health disparities in medicine
- Why we must look within ourselves first if we want to eradicate racism in the systems where we work
Links mentioned in this episode:
- Books by Victoria Sweet MD: Slow Medicine and God’s Hotel
- Join the team at Patreon.com/eolu and get access to the EOLU mug: “Mind if we talk about death?” (only Patrons can purchase it). PLUS get our new bonuses: the monthly EOL News Update, movie reviews from 2 Doctors and a Movie, and automatic access to A Year of Reading Dangerously!
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