End of Life Care

Increasing quality of life during life's last moments

One of the biggest challenges faced by the healthcare industry is patient quality of life during the last months of life. One third of all healthcare expenditure originates in treatment costs during the final year of life, and one third of that amount is from the final 3 months of life. Despite the volume of money spent during the terminal life period, patient quality of life suffers drastically. Dr. Patel has made it his aim to increase patient quality of life during this terminal period. Furthermore, he made it his aim to help patients who had entered the terminal phase of their life to "die well". As chief medical officer for the one of the largest hospice care agencies in the US, Dr. Patel been responsible for the TLC of over a thousand terminal patients at any given time.

Dr. Patel has dealt with death almost on a daily base. He is a trainer who teaches other doctors how to initiate the discussion about death and dying. He conducts live-in retreats for other doctors and healthcare providers to experience role play as a teaching tool to initiate discussions about end-of-life care. Dr. Patel has been a keynote speaker at a large medical association meeting on the topic of "Dying Better in the US". He has authored several articles on death and dying in national journals and magazines. He is also the author of Between Life and Death, a popular book published by Penguin in September 2020, which shares the stories of seven terminal patients of his, and how he guided them to embracing their own mortality and meet death on their own terms.

Speaking engagement on
Valued-based Cancer Care

Publications on Valued-based
Cancer Care