why? Just cause you think he can beat Trump? We have to be better than this

n/t

Beat Trump. And beat him BIG time. Stay focused on it.

All else can wait.

is just a repeat in the superficial appearance of decorum?

If we DO NOT defeat Trump we get NOTHING

appearing version of Trump, we still get nothing.

Or worse, someone with more money and intelligence to pursue a similar agenda.

"I can teach anyone how to be a farmer 1 dig a hole 2 put a seed in 3 put dirt on top 4 add water 5 up comes the corn”
The skill 4information technology is completely different you need more grey matter

But you knew that, right, Zackymilly?

that I see from the Bloomie supporters here astounds me. It's really the mirror image of the MAGAts and their "we don't care what he says, we just want the other side crushed, no matter who gets crushed along with it."

charges his company was sued for and the things he said. Nope, I don't believe it. Funny enough, the people that have worked with Bloomberg , without bashing him have said, oh you have to understand this is the kind of culture he was in at that time- In their attempt to explain away awful things he said, Wallstreet culture in the 80's was sexist and misogynistic. It still is. That's the culture he came from. Nobody that has worked with him and defended him, that I have seen thus far has said OH NO, that is totally not something Mike would say. Instead I have heard them try to explain the culture he came from and was used to at the time. When asked about one particular sexist comment he made, his answer was it was basically a Jewish joke and then he didn't recall saying it. Yet the shiny ads have convinced some people that he would have never said the things he was accused of.

It gives me a sinking pit in my stomach. Like Maria Theresa Kumar said on tv yesterday, Democrats need to know which Bloomberg they are getting. There are 2 sides to Bloomberg. Is it going to be the philanthropist Bloomberg or is it going to be Mayor Bloomberg? She knows that Philanthropist Bloomberg is great, he supports causes dems like. Mayor Bloomberg on the other hand, did not govern with democratic values. After all he was/is a republican. I'm not buying his new found come to Jesus apologies. Like Hugh Hewitt said, Mike's a republican that doesn't like guns and Pepsi.

I'm hearing people say wait, wait for all the things we want. I am reminded of Dr. Martin Luther King's letter from a Birmingham Jail.
“For years now I have heard the word "Wait!" It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This "Wait" has almost always meant "Never."

I can see it now, Bloomberg policies hurt the working class and poor as they did in NYC. People start criticizing and are continued to be told, you must wait, we have to clean up the mess Trump made and getting upset that a Dem President is being criticized after he saved us from Trump.

than Trump, FFS. He says farmers are dumb. He's grabbed more pussies than Trump. He is a total nightmare. And our leaders have let him in, acting like it's just fine to have this creature run on the Dem ticket? I feel like I'm in upside-down world.

but take me to that full quote in context.

ago, when farming was literally digging a hole, planting a seed, and watering it and it grows. I'm pretty sure a guy like Bloomberg knows that's not all there is to modern farming. Mediaite knows that too. The context was how to train people for jobs today, in an era when tech is squeezing out labor. That's not even a farming concern in this era. But he didn't say farmers were "dumb".

However I do appreciate his no holds barred attacks on Trump.

Prostate cancer is often not aggressively treated in the very elderly (I know this from my own family's experience).

Prostate cancer in old age is probably not what will kill the person who has it. Something else will.

my son has colon cancer and it has also shown up in his prostate which surprised his doctors. They are not treating the prostate cancer at this time just closely watching it.

I'm sure you know this, but everyone's cancer is different.
I was diagnosed with Prostate cancer at 42. Full prostatectomy, radiation and 3 years of hormone therapy. If that's not treating aggressively, not sure what is. Its all on a case by case basis.

with my son right now the colon cancer is the main concern. After the removal of his malignant colon tumor they found 9 precancerous cysts in the colon and one year later 13 more had to be removed. Some spots in his,right lung have appeared and they are doing another cat scan in 6 months to see where that is going. So with the prostate cancer, because it is slow moving, they are just watching it now.

Segal’s brother: …I apologize for bringing up conditions in New York City during this [visit], but in light of my brother’s death, I must tell you that we have, I know you know this, but from personal experience the overcrowding in the emergency rooms is insane. He was there for 73 hours [inaudible] —

Bloomberg: It’s going to get worse with the health care bill [the Affordable Care Act] and with the governor’s cutbacks, because the governor’s cutbacks — which, he may not have any choice in all fairness to the governor — but there’d be less money, some of these small hospitals will close, some of these other programs, and people will come to the HHC [New York Health and Hospitals Corporation] hospitals, and that’s —

Segal’s brother: — They’ll be there for days, [inaudible].

Bloomberg: Well, they try to decide what things they can fix right away and what things they can’t fix right away. If you’re bleeding, they’ll stop the bleeding, if you need an X-Ray, you’re going to have to wait. That’s just — all of these costs keep going up, nobody wants to pay any more money, and at the rate we’re going, health care is going to bankrupt us. So not only do we have a problem, it’s going to bankrupt us, and we’ve got to sit here and say which things we’re going to do and which things we’re not. Nobody wants to do that. If you show up with prostate cancer and you’re 95 years old, we should say, ‘Go and enjoy, have a nice [inaudible], lead a long life.’ There’s no cure and you can’t do anything. If you’re a young person, we should do something about it. Society’s not willing to do that yet. So we’re going to bankrupt us, and we’re not looking at prophylactic care. We’re not trying to take care of things so we don’t get sick. Nobody ever says thank you for keeping you from getting sick, they say thank you if you’re sick and we cure you […].

We have good drugs for that.

There's an obvious edit there.

I'm 66 and I would still opt for treatment and I would probably do so until 80 or 85. But then women in my family tend to live into their 90s and are fortunate to manage to live on their own until near their demise. (Though my mother died at 88. Her sisters refer to her as "just a girl" when she died.)

Treatment for something like cancer is almost worse than the disease. My father died of cancer after a three year battle and he commented that he regrets going thru chemo and radiation.

It bought him a few more years but his quality of life was not at all good ... and in his mind not worth it.

I have a Harley that I ride whenever I can. My entire family knows that I have a Do Not Resuscitate, and Do Not Force Feed order. It's on file with my primary care doctor also.

I love my life! Great retirement happening, great girlfriend, cool motorcycle ... I don't fear dying, I fear sitting in a wheelchair in a dirty diaper drooling on myself.

Back to the original post - at some point the medical community has to make a decision whether to pursue treating the disease or just care for the patient.

There is something to be said about quality of life and going bankrupt at 60 to live off children for remainder of years. It is something i think about hitting 60. You bet.

I agree with him.

There are fighters out there too who live really great important lives late into their 90's. I've been blessed to meet some of them. I know we all have to die, but its quite amazing when you meet a great spark of a person who is suffering with what could be cured by an inoculation, as they are doing in Cuba.

Can we concentrate on getting great healthcare to children first? The elderly already have Medicare (I'm going to be Medicare-eligible next month, and I think I don't deserve it any more than a 7-year-old.)

I'm pretty clear on this, and it hasn't changed one bit as I get older-- I'm not going to waste time and money trying to stave off death for a few months when I'm dying anyway. No chemo, no transplants, after 75. It's sensible, and it's what most countries with national health care do-- they limit the amount of extraordinary care after a certain age.

And implies that it is directed more towards people suffering than towards a cure in general - which would not disclude the elderly I think...?

What's True

Researchers with Cuba’s Center for Molecular Immunology have developed and approved an immunologic cancer therapy that improves survivability for certain types of cancers in some cases; as of January 2017, the drug has begun clinical trials for the treatment in the United States.

So, I do understand that living wills are more common and 'do not resuscitate' wishes are not deemed illegal in other countries.
Remember that horrible GOP propaganda onslaught of Nederlands killing seniors? My goodness.

To keep cost under control, those systems make what we see as unethical choices. They have to to insure overall system health.

I admit I wrote that before knowing exactly what was in the article.

I'd like to be comfortable, but I took care of several elderly family members who fought cancer and what they went through is not for me.

I've had a good run. There will be no heroic measures taken.

Cancer treatments are brutal. I wouldn't put my elderly dog or cat through that torture for a few extra days of misery.

I'm in my mid-60s now, and I've had open heart surgery to get this far. I'm not doing anything like that ever again.

any current cancer treatment, other than maybe High intensity focused ultrasound, would kill the patient faster than palliative treatments.

So would have my mother.

be out of pain and slip away peacefully, which is what happened. Before she lost consciousness the last words she heard was my telling her "I'm here, mother. I'm here."

It was my idea,not hers.No treatment just palliative care.

This fighting fire with fire thing is so old and tragic. If it's not Bernie, please give me Liz or Amy.

I know i needed my grandmothers well into their 90s and 100s. But my aunt was the one who got the cancer diagnosis when she was really vital and said to her doctor - i've had a great life, what would you do? And decided not to seek treatment beyond an operation at about 93. The year before i ran into her at the community college - she was with some book club or something. She was driving everywhere and living on her own. She had a nice life at the time. She was a good sport while she got sick and suddenly had too much attention from her niece and nephew and their kids in the year it took to succumb. A high school mate of hers she got a good job for after high school, who did really well with it, tried to pay for her care 75 years later. There is something to be said for being in control of how you die. So the control should not be taken away from anyone.

Does this standard apply to him, or is it one of those double-standards?

I would think that, no matter how wealthy he is and what "plan" he has, he would then be the first to refuse treatment in his old age so it doesn't put a strain on resources, right? Oh, wait, he's talking about the rabble. Doh! His bubble ascends higher than us. Yes, the disposable, useless eaters. Right. Got it. Forgot! Sorry.

Maybe we could have doors that say, "Health Care This Way" that open right into a crematorium? Sounds like a reasonable extrapolation of that thinking, (disposable) because the feeling and effects of real people are not being considered there. Oh, can we at least have luxury euthanasia parlors, and commercial suicide assistance laws, pretty please? Just a little compassion?

Or is this that Randian-style hypocrisy again? It certainly doesn't sound compassionate at all. Cold. Calculated, but neither altruistic nor compassionate.

that was bedridden to begin with, so she could live under hospice care in the end. I don't understand that decision. I don't think people understand end of life decisions.

He said there was no point in treating it. No one disagreed with the doctor.

Every case is different and every case needs to be judged on its own merits. But we should be able to talk about costs and effectiveness in each case.

surgery is a better course given complications. It is slow moving, so not a good example. Of course doctors should be honest about pros and cons of treatment with the elderly and their family.

"You show up with prostate cancer and you're 95 years old ..."

people the choice to be treated. My bad if I have misunderstood his position and he addressed only a narrow disease set. I stand to be corrected.

However, this is but one issue to focus on in considering Bloomberg’s candidacy. I am sure his views will be vetted in future debate and he will have a chance then to clarify as to his healthcare stance and a range of concerns.

Segal’s brother: …I apologize for bringing up conditions in New York City during this [visit], but in light of my brother’s death, I must tell you that we have, I know you know this, but from personal experience the overcrowding in the emergency rooms is insane. He was there for 73 hours [inaudible] —

Bloomberg: It’s going to get worse with the health care bill [the Affordable Care Act] and with the governor’s cutbacks, because the governor’s cutbacks — which, he may not have any choice in all fairness to the governor — but there’d be less money, some of these small hospitals will close, some of these other programs, and people will come to the HHC [New York Health and Hospitals Corporation] hospitals, and that’s —

Segal’s brother: — They’ll be there for days, [inaudible].

Bloomberg: Well, they try to decide what things they can fix right away and what things they can’t fix right away. If you’re bleeding, they’ll stop the bleeding, if you need an X-Ray, you’re going to have to wait. That’s just — all of these costs keep going up, nobody wants to pay any more money, and at the rate we’re going, health care is going to bankrupt us. So not only do we have a problem, it’s going to bankrupt us, and we’ve got to sit here and say which things we’re going to do and which things we’re not. Nobody wants to do that. If you show up with prostate cancer and you’re 95 years old, we should say, ‘Go and enjoy, have a nice [inaudible], lead a long life.’ There’s no cure and you can’t do anything. If you’re a young person, we should do something about it. Society’s not willing to do that yet. So we’re going to bankrupt us, and we’re not looking at prophylactic care. We’re not trying to take care of things so we don’t get sick. Nobody ever says thank you for keeping you from getting sick, they say thank you if you’re sick and we cure you […].

A colleague told me that one of her very close friends who happens to be a physician was paying out a fortune coupled with the insurance claims to keep her elderly mother alive in a senior living facility. The mother was not coherent, she could not take care of herself, she did not communicate and she was fed intravenously. Her life consisted of laying in bed hooked up to tubes to prolong her life. This is one example of what many families are facing. They are bankrupting themselves and using healthcare resources for loved ones that really are not living.

It's a difficult discussion and it sounds harsh but we need to discuss end of life more openly.

Every person has the right to chose what a doctor can or cannot do for/to them.

End of Life Concerns

Hospice Care
When Is a "Do Not Resuscitate" Order the Right Choice?

Sometime a "natural death" is the best option for everyone.

snip

Recently, I was talking with a patient of mine about whether he would like to sign a DNR. His first answer was that he would like to sign one. He didn’t want to be resuscitated, because he wouldn’t want to live with any kind of brain or heart damage. His daughter then interjected and assured him that people have heart attacks all the time, and they’re fine -- no brain or heart damage. That was enough to change his mind.

He had completed advanced directives previously that stated his wish not to be kept alive on life support. I reminded him of this, and both he and his daughter replied that the paramedics should get him breathing again and to the hospital, and then the doctors could decide what to do. This man had terminal lung cancer that had spread to his brain.



Television has done an excellent job of distorting true medicine, including the resuscitation of dying patients. The medical shows may depict a man who is in cardiac arrest getting CPR and waking up in the middle of chest compressions. Many of the patients shown on TV in the emergency department are revived and back to their old selves in no time. Is it really that simple, though?


I hated to be the bearer of bad news, but I had to inform him of what he was facing. Resuscitation isn’t as clean and gentle as they portray on television. The chest must be compressed hard and deep enough to pump the blood out of the heart. This can lead to broken ribs, punctured lungs and possibly an injured heart.1 Paramedics move beyond the gentle mouth-to-mouth breathing and insert a breathing tube into the patient’s throat. Electrical shocks may have to be delivered to attempt to shock the heart back into a normal rhythm. An intravenous line (IV) would be started, so potent medications could be delivered through it. The patient is transported to the hospital, and if they aren’t already pronounced dead, they may be instantly hooked up to life support machines, without consulting with family.


What are the chances that all of this will work? The statistics, while not highly accurate due to variances in reporting methods, show that survival after resuscitation is 6 to 15% for patients already in a hospital, 1 to 2% for patients in nursing homes and between 4 to 38% for patients who were resuscitated in non-health care End of Life Concerns


Read More: https://www.verywellhealth.com/hands-off-do-not-resuscitate-1132382

My mom has signed one, she will be 94 in a few months and we have been doing homecare for two years. My sibling has signed one and she is a year and a half older than myself. I will sign one in the near future.

My mother had a DNR. I'll sign one, too, sometime in the future.

to do in most cases, but not in all. An Arbitrary year to discontinue care is abhorrent to most of us. And I seem to remember Republican accused Obamacare of cutting care at 75! Mike, Mike, Mike your not the Great Democratic hope!

She says "If I get cancer, I want palliative or quality-of-life care, and nothing else. Put the money that would be spent on expensive treatments into making quality hospice care universally available, and treating young people."

Of course, Mom was a nurse. We watched my 53-year-old father die of lung cancer in the 1970s, and my 92-year-old grandfather die of multiple myeloma in the 1990s. The experiences were very different.

But I suspect if you took a poll of people 90 and older, they would mostly agree, for most forms of cancer.

speculatively,
Bright

system. Britain and lots of countries limit care in cases like this.

But, Americans would squeal if they were denied a treatment, drug, test, etc., they felt entitled to. I’ve often thought that is one reason government officials haven’t wanted to be the ones making those decisions.

But it's a discussion worth having.

And if we don't have it on a national scale at some point, you should at least have it within your family.

My wife and I are in decent enough health, but neither of us wants to be kept alive artificially if that arises. Gotta get to the paperwork.

My mother is 90, sharp as a tack, but frail. I don't know what her preferences are, though I think she feels as I do. She watched her parents and in-laws wither from senility, and her husband from Alzheimers. I'm pretty sure she doesn't want to follow that path or impose that on her remaining children. Again, gotta sort that out. Cost isn't really the issue, what with Medicare, but is that "right" for us as a society, especially as the US population ages?

So, again, maybe indelicate, but not wrong.

It does highlight a political problem. As much as candidates tend to talk in shortcuts - at the very least, they're exhausted most of the time - they need to take care, as anything can be misconstrued or misrepresented.

I don't disagree with his overall point. Most of my family is in healthcare.

Why are you doing so?

In the audio Bloomberg clearly states prostate cancer not all cancers.

Prostate cancers are often no longer treated in elderly men because of liklihood that a patient will die of some other condition and negative side effects of surgical interventions often do more harm then good. What is done is monitoring or "watchful waiting."

The twitterer in this case, Finkelstein, has been advised of his misquoting but apparently. has not changed his tweet.
I do think it is wrong to misquote in this way and hope that you will correct ypur post by pointing this out or deleting.
If we don't stand for facts and truth-who will?

Am I too old? Too poor? Too brown? Somehow I think he'd mobilize an army of doctors and specialists to save himself at any age.

and need a tax cut.

And was in palliative care before he did so. It's time to put end-of-life discussions on the table without the emotion.

Oh, that's right - you're a billionaire. Dying of cancer because you're denied care is for the 99% "dregs" of society.

NT

Unless maybe if it were a specific treatment for a specific, life-shortening cancer with a very high success rate in very elderly patients.

Which is to say ... NOT prostate cancer.

President Carter was diagnosed with a cancer that he thought would kill him fairly quickly. I'm glad that he got treatment.

Just because you're 95 at the time.

Or sidewise claim it is denying treatment for a bad migraine if a person 95 years old.

The same people leading the assault are the same ones that worship European style social medicine, where end of life decisions for the very old are made on a daily basis.

"The cancer is typically so slow-growing, that many of these men will die from other causes, which means the benefits of treatment do not always outweigh the risks."

Testify!

Apparently this quote was specifically about Prostate Cancer, not cancer period.

As many have pointed out, that's actually exactly what they already do with prostate cancer.

I fcking people who fcking LIE like this on twitter I swear to Dog.

And if you think insurance companies are more generous when it comes to this kind of thing, you'd be wrong.

If you make it to 95 and then come down with terminal cancer ... then it's just your time to go, folks. I'm sorry. It's sad ... but that's life. That would be a great life, in fact ...

Working in a hospital is watching someone keep another human alive well past the point they should have died. I’m sorry if I show up at 95 with metastatic cancer, give me my drip. When family members decide to keep their 95 year old mom or dad a full code ( means all means necessary allowed to sustain life) that is truly angering. Because the trauma inflicted by that one event is not a dignified death. We as a society have so sheltered death away from society that we no longer accept it as a natural part of life.

who simultaneously are terrified of letting an old person go, while maintaining absolute certainty that the person is 'with God now, Living Forever in Paradise' and that they'll 'see them again someday' ... once they pass?

Just curious if you have a feel for that?

Cause you'd THINK that non-religious types would do this sort of thing in greater %'s, what with them thinking death is literally the end and all.

It’s the hardest thing to do for a patient and family to make that decision to quit treatment. It’s natural to want to keep them alive, but I feel people can’t let go even though death is staring them in the face. Well educated and well intentioned people still make piss poor decisions for their family members.

I have a theory that, in the past we were born, raised, lived and died in the same house, plus we witnessed all of this with our family members, so people were comfortable with death and the dying process. But now we have shifted all death to this sterile hospital setting and in the ICU away from society so now no one is even slightly comfortable. Palliative care is truly one of the most angelic things that exists in healthcare. And is often underutilized because people equate it with death.

If my mind and body are still functioning at 95 I want treatment. I’ve spent my adult life with crap ass insurance. More and more people will be living to 100. Just cuz we are expensive doesn’t mean we should be out on the ice flow.

With prostate cancer. Most recommend no treatment at that age because it could kill you while prostate cancer is slow moving. In this case the doctor should do exactly what Bloomberg said: explain it, explain the options but in his opinion he should go home and enjoy his time left.

This is a conversation that needs having but in this case the quote is out of context and used disingenuously.

He's right if this thread is any proof.

When is it all too much?

Yet another reason to vote carefully.

They make routine hard choices. Their costs would blow skyhigh otherwise.

If a 95 year old has a simple cancer that has a high cure rate via simple procedures, then treat the person. But if that person has a difficult cancer that has a low cure rate after an expensive treatment, is it worth it to society to expend that money? Even if it was me, my answer would be no.

hot under the collar, I try to avoid that. Again, I apologize.

I think single payer is the way to go, but by no means do I think anyone should be pretending that we'll get there anytime soon. It will have to be a slow process, it's a big country and it won't be simple quick or easy.

When that country was considering a nationalized medicine system, there was no agreement, conservative provinces wanted nothing to do with such a system. So a compromise was reached, provinces that wanted to go to a social medicine system were allowed to, with some assistance from the government. After a few years, the recalcitrant provinces realized that they had made a mistake, and the true national system was formed.

I believe what blue states with solid democratic control should do is band together to form their system. Since states regulate which insurance companies can sell there, those collection of states can legally refuse to license any company whose policies and procedures don't meet minimum standards. The collection of states could also set up one insurance agency to cover them all and compete with the private plans. I believe that what will happen in the end is red states will realize how screwed they are and ask to join the blue states' plan, which they should be allowed to join as long as they agree to abide be the rules of that plan and not attempt to amend it - also, they would be junior members until they have proven their sincerity.

Another big country that had to move this direction slowly and not all at once.

They have 30+ million people, more than any Scandinavian country, less than Britain. The most important thing is their plan was set in a stable society, not one ravaged by war and having to rebuild like the European countries did.

I have no idea where or how to draw the line, but it needs to be done. Major surgeries and torturous chemotherapy should not be routinely inflicted upon the very elderly. Our society needs to accept that we all die eventually and we should be able to do so in a comfortable and accepting way.

Of course, having the decisions be in the hands of the government (or corporations) via the health care system under the pressures of financial concerns is not desirable either. We should make sensible guidelines, then have our government work for us within those guidelines.

The blunt delivery needs to be improved and the "nothing we can do" needs to include the palliative care that should always be available. Truth is, many elderly patients with cancer are not looking for heroic measures. Rather they wish to die with dignity without the crushing pain. Because we refuse to address 'right to die' policies, I've read that many seniors with terminal diagnoses are taking matters into their own hands--refusing to eat and drink.

It's a conversation we seriously need to have. Long overdue.

That was a ham handed way of saying it and I’d rather see Bloomberg as our nominees’s campaign manager than the nominee.

People here do realize that systems like the NHS typically lag the US in approving treatments? Don’t they? Well worth having today’s treatments be free or cheap to patients, but patients close to death will feel cheated. Don’t have statistics of a typical lag but the couple of times i looked a drug up it was a year or two.

I haven’t researched end of life care but I’d expect limits there too.

got major surgery for the aunt, who died 6 weeks later to no one's surprise.

With the ever rising number of 90 year old folk; we're going to have to face fiscal realities as some point - recognizing the damage that these hospital habitues do in so many ways, to the young.

I don't know if I would want it at 95 I guess depending on the treatment. Just some of the treatment could kill you. I'm 62 and if I get sick enough I have to lose my house to pay for treatment I would forego the treatment. I can't be homeless and sick too.

Giving a patient treatment or surgery just because they demand it is irresponsible and no good doctor should agree.

It happens though. Antibiotics are erroneously prescribed to patients with viral infections to make the patient shut up all the time.

He or she would tell you the treatment is going to be worse than the cancer.

The cancer grows slowly and the treatment can kill them faster than the cancer.

My kids had a gut wrenching decision last year with regards to my ex. She was 61 and on life support with really no good future. She had sepsis and, even if they managed to stabilize her condition, she was never going to leave a long-term care facility. No doubt she'd be left with little or no cognitive response to recover.

They asked me of my opinion and I told them that, if it were me in that bed, I'd want them to shut down the heroic measures and put me on a morphine drip. I know she would have wanted this as well. It took some time, but they both realized that this was the humane approach to this situation.

It was a skin cancer spot on her nose, and it went deep. She declined treatment at first, but none of us wanted to see her suffer through facial disfigurement and a painful death that could be prevented.

She had the surgery, they did the necessary skin grafts, and she's recovering nicely. But if something else goes wrong, she won't rush to treatment.

Every system one way or the other has to have ways to say no. We should be more open about ours than we are.

Prostate cancer is not aggressive and the treatment may do more harm than good in a very elderly person with likely comorbidities. This is not against what medical professionals might recommend.

Not a fan of Bloomberg but twisting this to mean that he wants to let sick old people die is irresponsible fearmongering.

He’s talking about prostate cancer and changing today’s status quo for the young. Instead of merely monitoring the cancer, there could be a way to intervene at a younger age.

When someone uses deception through taking a quote out of context, it’s hard to believe anything they say since they have a plainly destructive agenda. There is so much of this garbage on Twitter.

...another health issue. My MIL had a tumor in her breast diagnosed in her late 80s..she chose NOT to have anything done and lived to 104. I think maybe aggressive treatment at an advanced age could either lessen the life or the quality of life. So I kinda see where hes going here.

I have seen 105 year old people who look great and have their wits in tact.
And then there are 80 year old people who look like death warmed over.

So do not generalize based on age alone.

will dramatically change aging and what it means to be human. Unfortunately,
if financial backwardness is not removed it will continue to be a hindrance to
the technologies' universal application.

They'd rather enjoy the time that's left to them. Cancer treatment is so hard on a body.

He had surgery and chemo for Stage 4 colon cancer. After a year of treatment, he said: Enough. He died 3 months later.

During the treatments he had absolutely no quality of life. Couldn't leave the house, basically never left his recliner except for doctor visits. The physicians at the University of Penn would have continued. In fact, his oncologist was surprised when he decided to quit. "But you look so much better," he said. This was directed to a man over 6 feet tall who weighed 125 pounds at the end. He looked ghastly, had no strength or stamina. He never really had a chance to recover from the initial surgery and never accepted the ileostomy. He gave it a go but then pulled his own plug. It was hard to witness but it was his decision.

So yes, cancer treatments are brutal enough on a strapping 40-year old. On the elderly, they're absolutely horrible.

Some doctors get it, others don't.

We've had multiple family deaths since then. But Big John's death really made me think about facing my own death in the future. What sort of end do I want? What interventions are appropriate? When my mother-in-law died 3 years ago, I had an up close and personal look at how palliative care can make all the difference in facilitating a gentle death vs a frightening struggle.

I think your elderly friends have the right mindset. If a diagnosis is terminal--enjoy the time you have left. For myself, that would include calling the palliative team in for a consult.

Btw, thanks for the comment.

And yes, some doctors definitely don't get it.

Can’t let the perfect get in the way of the good.

Sounds a bit Stalinesque to me...a lot like insurance company death panels.

Segal’s brother: …I apologize for bringing up conditions in New York City during this [visit], but in light of my brother’s death, I must tell you that we have, I know you know this, but from personal experience the overcrowding in the emergency rooms is insane. He was there for 73 hours [inaudible] —

Bloomberg: It’s going to get worse with the health care bill [the Affordable Care Act] and with the governor’s cutbacks, because the governor’s cutbacks — which, he may not have any choice in all fairness to the governor — but there’d be less money, some of these small hospitals will close, some of these other programs, and people will come to the HHC [New York Health and Hospitals Corporation] hospitals, and that’s —

Segal’s brother: — They’ll be there for days, [inaudible].

Bloomberg: Well, they try to decide what things they can fix right away and what things they can’t fix right away. If you’re bleeding, they’ll stop the bleeding, if you need an X-Ray, you’re going to have to wait. That’s just — all of these costs keep going up, nobody wants to pay any more money, and at the rate we’re going, health care is going to bankrupt us. So not only do we have a problem, it’s going to bankrupt us, and we’ve got to sit here and say which things we’re going to do and which things we’re not. Nobody wants to do that. If you show up with prostate cancer and you’re 95 years old, we should say, ‘Go and enjoy, have a nice [inaudible], lead a long life.’ There’s no cure and you can’t do anything. If you’re a young person, we should do something about it. Society’s not willing to do that yet. So we’re going to bankrupt us, and we’re not looking at prophylactic care. We’re not trying to take care of things so we don’t get sick. Nobody ever says thank you for keeping you from getting sick, they say thank you if you’re sick and we cure you […].