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Edward T. Creagan, M.D.
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Edward T. Creagan, M.D.
Edward Creagan, M.D.
"The magic of the electronic village is transforming health information. The mouse and keyboard have extended the stethoscope to the 500 million people now online." — Dr. Edward Creagan
The power of the medium inspires Dr. Edward Creagan as he searches for ways to share Mayo Clinic's vast resources with the general public.
Dr. Creagan, a Newark, N.J., native, is board certified in internal medicine, medical oncology, and hospice medicine and palliative care. He has been with Mayo Clinic since 1973 and in 1999 was president of the staff of Mayo Clinic.
Dr. Creagan, a professor of medical oncology at Mayo Clinic College of Medicine, was honored in 1995 with the John and Roma Rouse Professor of Humanism in Medicine Award and in 1992 with the Distinguished Mayo Clinician Award, Mayo's highest recognition. He has been recognized with the American Cancer Society Professorship of Clinical Oncology.
He describes his areas of special interest as "wellness as a bio-psycho-social-spiritual-financial model" and fitness, mind-body connection, aging and burnout.
Dr. Creagan has been an associate medical editor with Mayo Clinic's health information websites and has edited publications and CD-ROMs and reviewed articles.
"We the team of (the website) provide reliable, easy-to-understand health and wellness information so that each of us can have productive, meaningful lives," he says.
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Stress blog
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Aug. 21, 2010
Advance directives: A gift to your loved ones
By Edward T. Creagan, M.D.
A recurrent and important theme in the blog comments over the past few weeks has been the issue of end-of-life decisions and quality of life.
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One of the greatest gifts that you can give your family and yourself is a living will or advance directives to document your wishes related to end-of-life care. Advance directives guide your care in two ways:
- Naming a proxy — a person who can speak for you if you can't speak for yourself. This representative, who might be a spouse or partner, or another designated family member or friend, has the legal authority to act on our behalf in health care matters.
- Spelling out what care you want — and don't want — if you have an irreversible, life-threatening condition.
It was recently brought home to me just how important advance directives can be. While on hospital assignment, I saw a gentleman who was a professional basketball referee. While working in a summer league, he'd had a massive hemorrhage into his brain and lapsed into a coma. There was no reasonable probability of improvement in his condition, so I was asked to talk with the family concerning end-of-life and comfort measures. Around the patient's bedside were his wife and two devoted adult sons. Each was painfully conflicted as to how aggressive to be to sustain their loved one's life.
When I visited with the family the next day, they shared a document they'd found in their father's desk at home. He'd clearly written out in his own hand that he did not want any artificial hydration, nutrition, or breathing or kidney machines if there was no likelihood of improvement. This document provided tremendous relief for the family, since they now knew how to act in accordance with their loved one's wishes.
Please take time to document your wishes today. No one knows what tomorrow may bring.
12 comments posted
July 28, 2012 4:59 p.m.
A huge problem with our society is that many people do not understand that their is a huge difference between living and existing. Living an active, fruitful life is living....whereas, being in a vegetative state is merely existing. Shame on our society for allowing trillions of dollars to be wasted on futile healthcare. Shame on our society for not allowing preventative healthcare (which promotes living) to be a priority.
- Amy
April 28, 2012 5:03 a.m.
this is a very nice post thanks for sharing this i really like this ...
- mary
February 10, 2012 10:16 a.m.
My 5 children have copies of my living will. I personally believe that there are worse things than dying. I choose to relieve my children of the guilt of "letting me go" and I choose to die completely as opposed to what I call half-gone; that is when the brain is dead and there is no hope for improvement but the body is kept alive by technology. While I enjoy life and I have the natural instinct to avoid death that we are all born with, I am not afraid to die.
- Shawna
August 29, 2010 2:56 a.m.
Your note was right on. I plan to make my wishes written down soon. Thanks for the reminder. q4qkw3
- Sue
August 28, 2010 11:49 a.m.
Sergio, if you have an advanced directive then you can decide about how you want to die. The issues are complex and require thought and planning. We begin to die when we are born. None of us should leave it to our family caregivers to decide. If any reader has had to make a decision for a family member without a directive, then I would say that you likely did you best. That is is all your relative would want.
- Barbara
August 27, 2010 5:09 p.m.
An Advanced Directive is not legal euthanasia. What is not understood is people kept "alive" by artificial means are DEAD! They (Soul or whatever you believe makes them who they are) have left their body and they are now just mechanized hulls, machines stopping the "physical" dying /shutting down process. Just because Science now allows for artificial life doesn't make it right to employ it. What used to be a medically based doctor's decision is now the decision of families and friends who base decisions on how it makes them feel. If they feel guilty, person's BODY kept alive (thanks to law suits now too). If a child/teenager/young, person's BODY kept alive, and so on ....
- Monae
August 26, 2010 10:09 p.m.
My husband and I have advanced directives and our children at this time are in agreement with our wishes. I have heard of families who won't follow directives because they have guilt feelings about allowing their parents to die. When the quality of life is gone and there is no hope what is the reason for not following directives. I have seen more money spent uselessly when there is no hope. I want to go to heaven when it's time for my life to be over and not be hooked up to machines.
- Ferne
August 25, 2010 2:34 p.m.
Sergio, It is not euthanasia to do a advance directive or living will. If we had lived in Jesus' time we would have died naturally without the use of machines or IV's. Show me in the bible where it says we should be hooked up to a machine to live as a vegetable!!! I wish my mother who died of Alzheimers would have had an advance directive or living will.
- Becky
August 24, 2010 8:39 p.m.
That is a frank permissive form of euthanasia
- Sergio
August 24, 2010 3:51 p.m.
We have just updated our health care directives and had a family meeting with our three children---they are all "on board" with our wishes. As our daughter said "I"ll never do to you what my cousin did to your brother" his last six weeks of life were in a hospital under conditions he would NOT have wanted. A relationship with a family care doctor who also understands this also helps. We chose to do this since my husband has just been diagnoses with mild Alzheimer's---he continues to function well and tutor in a correctional facility; they know him and want him to continue as long as he can. We know the time will come when strong decisions need to be made and we're trying to have our wishes known strongly.
- Alice
August 22, 2010 3:41 p.m.
Having advance directives is better than not having them at all. I am a daughter who made a decision to refuse a treatment and allow my 93 year old mother a natural death, in the care of hospice whose only direction from her was, "you'll know what to do." I would have more peace today if she had been more clear about her choices. We need to voice our choices and choose someone we trust to honor those choices.
- Loretta
August 21, 2010 6:50 a.m.
In principle Advanced Directives are great & these documents may work well in a fancy facility such as yours. I am not fully convenienced in poorly staffed health care settings they function as well-- in respect to adequate nursing care resources being allocated when push comes to shove to patients with directives. On paper directives are very good, but they are only as good in practice as the compassion of the health care settings management if you know what I mean.
- Big Carol
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