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Atul Gawande

Atul Gawande Quotes

Surgeon

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Famous Atul Gawande Quotes

“The terror of sickness and old age is not merely the terror of the losses one is forced to endure, but also the terror of the isolation. As people become aware of the finitude of their life, they do not ask for much. They do not seek more riches. They do not seek more power. They ask only to be permitted, insofar as possible, to keep sharing the story of their life in the world - to make choices and sustain connections to others according to their own priorities. In modern society we have come to assume that debility and dependence rule out such autonomy.”

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Book:Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End
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“We imagine that we can wait until the doctors tell us that there is nothing more they can do. But rarely is there nothing more that doctors can do. They can give toxic drugs of unknown efficacy, operate to try to remove part of the tumor, put in a feeding tube if a person can’t eat: there’s always something. We want these choices. But that doesn’t mean we are eager to make the choices ourselves. Instead, most often, we make no choice at all. We fall back on the default, and the default is: Do Something. Fix Something. Is there any way out of this?”

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Book:Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End
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