Nationally known palliative care doctor, Jessica Zitter, says medical school students are taught how to keep patients alive, but no one teaches them how to let a patient die.

Dr. Zitter's best selling book "Extreme Measures", was part biography and part expose into how our culture deals with death and dying. She argues that our current medical culture puts patients on what she calls the "End of Life Conveyor Belt."

Grave Concerns host Cathy Wurzer sat down with Jessica Zitter to talk about Zitter's quest to change how we die in the United States and the intersection of medicine and movie making. Dr. Zitter is one of a handful of working physicians who also produce films.

Dr. Zitter's non-profit organization is Reel Medicine Media.

Life is so busy, who has time to think about stuff like wills, financial trusts, power of attorney or advance care directives? All important legal documents, but getting them done falls pretty far down our "to-do" list and there can be some pretty big consequences because of that.

In this episode of "Grave Concerns" we have a check-list of items to ponder and why they are important, plus we touch on the topic of legacy.

Two great guests in one episode: Jill Sauber, an elder law attorney in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area (https://sauberlaw.com/) and Ross Levin of Accredited Investors Wealth Management. (https://www.accredited.com/ross-levin) join Cathy in a wide ranging conversation.

It's difficult to think of our own death, much less the passing of a loved one. According to the Conversation Project, more than 90% of us think it's important to discuss end-of-life wishes, yet only a fraction of us do it.

Those conversations happen even less frequently and it's often a taboo topic, especially among medical professionals and care providers for people with an intellectual and/or developmental disability. (IDD)

Approximately 7 to 8.5 million people in the U.S. have an intellectual and/or developmental disability (IDD), representing about 3%–5% of the total population, and they are often not at the table for end of life discussions. Why is that?

In this episode of Grave Concerns, host Cathy Wurzer dives head-long into the conversation with three guests who have helped people in the IDD community talk about their mortality and why they need to be included in these conversations.

Sarah Hall is a researcher at the University of Minnesota. She was joined by Sue Walker and Cate Saracen-Peters from Hammer and NER, one of the largest disability service providers in Minnesota.

Some of the resources discussed in this episode are here: https://www.caresearch.com.au/tel/

https://ageucate.com/

https://hammer.org/together-we-ensure-tomorrow/aging-well-end-of-life-care/