IN THE MEDIA/
PRESS & REVIEWS
"Slow Medicine is just this caring process of slowing down, being patient, coordinating care, and remaining faithful to the end. Families necessarily bear the greatest responsibility in surmounting difficulties to create this bond of trust and security for their loved ones. Over and over, families must identify and ask for what they and their parents need, seeking links to caring professionals who also want to do the right thing, but are often constrained by organizational, institutional, and cultural health care practices that are not fully serving our elders and us...yet." "Two books outline ways we can better use our resources to care for seniors. "My Mother, Your Mother" by Dennis McCullough, and "Alone and Invisible" by Allan "Chip" Teel"
—Maine Voices: Elderly Benefit From "Slow Medicine" by Ronald G. Thurston "Kent's post was enough to send me to Amazon.com to order Dr. McCullough's text" —TheThe Slow Medicine Movement: My, Mother, Your Mother by Dan Dunlop from THE HEALTHCARE MARKETER OnLine Resource "When considering what activities to pursue, don't allow your 'art form' to be too narrowly defined," suggests Dennis McCullough, M.D...."Be aware of what level of social engagement or contact is optimum for you. For some persons, a large amount of shared activity is stimulating, but for others, the need for more individual quiet time is necessary for their creative pursuits. Establishing the right amount of sufficient space is very important to ensure that your individual needs are met. And perhaps most important, you need to let go of the notion that you are being judged. Engage in these activities as a form of play!" —Rekindling the Creative Spark as You Age, Susanne Matthiesen, Newsweek Showcase Archives "In an age when everything moves at lightening speed and health care payors reward physicians for seeing ever more patients, the idea of slowing down care may seem shocking. Yet, the concept of 'slow medicine' is gaining attention and the admiration of practitioners, patients, and others." —Slow Medicine in a Fast World Means Better Care, Joanne Kaldy "The information in [My Mother, Your Mother] is so valuable because it will help sandwich generation, babyboomers and elder parents themselves become educated and empowered consumers in the health care system. But this book really needs to be kept in a prominent place on the shelf and referred to over an over, as elder parents enter each new stage of life and health described in it." —Geriatric Care for Elderly Parents, Lisa C. DeLuca "In a recent chat, McCullough shared his personal pearls, gleaned from being in the trenches, just like the rest of us, but in his case, mostly caregiving from afar." —Caring.com: Caregiving Advice From a Doctor Who's Been There, Sarah Henry "McCullough is one of many medical professionals who have come to recognize that this country's current health-care system swings between inflicting on the elderly too little care (not spending enough time listening and not stepping in early because of cost constraints) and too much care (recommending invasive diagnostic tests and treatments that may be inadvisable for someone who is frail or battling multiple ailments). It's a system, he and others have concluded, that is expensive, inefficient, and not particularly humane. "Care is what matters," McCullough says, "not intervention." —Lessons in Dying Well, Deborah Lee Luskin, Dartmouth Medicine, Fall 2008 "The term slow medicine was coined by Dr. Dennis McCullough, a Dartmouth geriatrician, Kendal's founding medical director and author of [MY MOTHER, YOUR MOTHER]." —For the Elderly, Being Heard About Life's End, Jane Gross, The New York Times, May 5, 2008 "With the aim of protecting the quality of life of elderly patients, Dennis McCullough, a member of the Dartmouth Medical School faculty and former Kendal medical director, developed the idea of "slow medicine" -- a slower, more deliberate and critical approach to medical treatment for the elderly. Many physicians automatically advocate aggressive treatment for all patients' diseases, but the idea of slow medicine suggests that such treatment is not always best for elderly patients." —Emily Goodell, The Dartmouth, May 15, 2008 "The pace of care should be slowed to a crawl. For doctors, that means starting medications at low doses and increasing them gradually. For children, that means learning not to panic and yell for an ambulance on every bad day. And for a good overall picture of a parent's condition, a child is well advised to ignore the usual medical and nursing jargon and to focus instead on the sound of the parent's own voice. 'No one,' Dr. McCullough says, 'can be a bigger expert on a parent's voice than a former teenager trained in the same household.'" —Abigail Zuger, M.D., The New York Times, February 26, 2008 "This book will literally speak volumes to many baby boomers who find themselves helping aging parents through their late-life journey." —Peggy Carlson, The Free Lance-Star, April 27, 2008 "A wise and serious borrowing from the increasingly popular Slow Food Movement, Slow Medicine is a breath of fresh air in a medical climate too often marked by tales of turbulent weather." —Constance Putnam, The Nashua Telegraph "[My Mother, Your Mother] is aimed at adult children of aging parents. It's full of advice on how to get involved in their care, and the kind of conversations you should have with their doctors." —Julia McKinnell, Maclean's Magazine, March 12, 2008 "My Mother, Your Mother is a welcome, clear-eyed look at the complicated relationship of child and parent, when the child and the parent reverse roles...A remarkable book." —James I. Armstrong, President Emeritus, Middlebury College "[McCullough] has done something very special...[My Mother, Your Mother] provides sensible, authoritative, sensitive, and appropriate help...This is a book I will recommend to my patients and their families." —Daniel D. Federman, M.D., Senior Dean for Alumni Relations and Clinical Teaching, Carl W. Walter Distinguished Professor of Medicine and Medical Education, Harvard Medical School "[McCullough's] background, qualifications, and determination make for a mix that cannot be matched...practical [books] like this do not come around very often." —Edward W. Campion, M.D., Senior Deputy Editor and Online Editor, New England Journal of Medicine and former Chief of the Geriatrics Unit at the Massachusetts General Hospital "With wisdom and compassion, clinical master Dr. McCullough presents the perfect antidote to 'fast medicine' and the devaluing of our elders. My Mother, Your Mother explains the challenges faced by aging parents and how to best help our loved ones maintain their freedom, comfort, and dignity. This book is a must-read if you are now or will soon be caring for someone at the end of life." —John Abramson, M.D., author of Overdosed America "[My Mother, Your Mother] is designed to be a unique combination of up-to-date geriatrics, seasoned advice, and personal memoir. The combination works... He effectively uses stories from other people's lives, as well as from his own, in a way that instructs, validates, and normalizes... That said, My Mother, Your Mother is one of the best books I have read on the subject of caring for our aging loved ones, if not the best. It is helpful, honest, both understandable and understanding, and very wise. It has provided me with new insights as I deal these days with my own father." —James Miller, contributor to InSight, The Willowgreen Newsletter "People facing the health challenges of their very old family members WILL have a new resource to keep handy on their bookshelves and bedside tables. Dennis McCullough's book, "My Mother, Your Mother LP: Embracing "Slow Medicine," the Compassionate Approach to Caring for Your Aging Loved Ones", bridges a major gap in available advice to the reading public. And McCullough reaches beyond the general public readership to health professional students and practitioners. He supports informal, family care-givers to do better what THEY want to do and makes clearer for clinical and social service providers the perspective of frail elders, their families and friends as they struggle with decisions and actions they must take... Dennis McCullough's experience as a thoughtful family doctor and geriatrician, perceptive medical educator and administrator and as a human being who has "been there", definitely qualifies him to serve as mentor." —Brian Hennen, M.D., Professor of Family Medicine, Dalhousie University "Here is a book about old age and death that is anything but depressing. On the contrary, My Mother, Your Mother breathes compassion, humanity and hope with every page. Dr. Dennis McCullough, a specialist in the care of older people, has written a warm, wise and eminently useful guide to what lies ahead for every person and every family facing the inevitable decline, crisis, and death of an older loved-one. This is a book especially valuable for millions of America's Baby Boomers who are going to care for older family members through cycles of illness, infirmity, momentary respite, and finally death and then the grieving, emotional healing and legacy work to follow. This book will help millions experience these passages with serenity, confidence and love... Dennis McCullough is just the sort of doctor Americans want and so desperately need." —Daniel Perry, Executive Director of the Alliance for Aging Research "The path described by Dr. McCullough in this book transcends cultural and regional differences to lead the way to better understanding and comfort as we all enter this final chapter of our lives." —Dr. Michael Fleming, former president of the American Academy of Family Physicians "[Dennis McCullough's] experience as a physician, especially at a continuing care retirement community, have prepared him well to understand the plight of elders caught up in a health care system that too often does not serve them well...McCullough's insights are valuable to all of us as we strive to build a system of care that truly serves our elders." —Patrick Flood, Commissioner, Vermont Agency of Human Services, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living "Some of us are getting to the age where we may be providing some level of care for our parents as well as our own families. It is a lot of work and stress to be in that position and the world of health care can be confusing. The VNA & Hospice of VT and NH (where I work) is putting on a free community education event called Caring for Mom and Dad. Dr. Dennis McCullough is giving this lecture based on his upcoming book titled My Mother, Your Mother..." —The uvScene "I feel that I am not alone." —Anonymous |
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