Ira Byock, MD
Biographical Information

Ira Byock, MD

Practicing Physician
Professor
Author
Advocate

Ira Byock, MD is a practicing physician. He is Director of Palliative Medicine at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, New Hampshire and Professor at Dartmouth Medical School. Dr. Byock has written widely on the ethics and practice of palliative care and health care systems change. He is a consistent advocate for the voice and rights of patients and their families.

The Best Care Possible

Making the Best of What Is Often the Very Worst Time of Our Lives
The Atlantic, March 7, 2012
Though death is the most inevitable fact of life, our social systems are broken when it comes to caring for people with advanced illnesses.
Americans are scared to death of dying. And with good reason. While rarely easy under any circumstances, we make dying a lot harder than it has to be.
A large majority of Americans still die in hospitals or nursing homes. Many suffer poorly controlled pain or other physical miseries and endure their final days feeling undignified and a burden to others.
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