Describing Death

Excerpt

I was on my Geriatrics rotation as a fourth-year medical student when my attending told me about a death certificate she needed to fill out. The patient was switching between clinicians, so he did not have a primary care physician when he died. When a patient dies without a clinician, it falls upon another clinician in the past to pursue the circumstances of the death. My attending’s name had been used recently to order labs for the patient after he was discharged from the hospital, in anticipation that he would see my attending in person. The family was looking for us to fill out a legal form, but it was more than just a formality to me. His death had been unexpected, and we still needed an answer. …