RT Journal
A1 Barnosky AR
T1 Dignity therapy: Final words for final days
JF JAMA
JO JAMA
YR 2012
FD June 20
VO 307
IS 23
SP 2550
OP 2550
DO 10.1001/jama.307.23.2550
UL http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/jama.307.23.2550
AB 
Palliative care retains the humanistic tradition in Western medicine that prioritizes the relief of human suffering and preservation of dignity among those with incurable and life-limiting diseases. Hospice and palliative medicine clinicians thus aspire to the common professional goal of becoming highly accomplished in clinical interventions that promote dignity in dying persons. The commitment to honoring human dignity when caring for the dying was perhaps best articulated by the late Dame Cicely Saunders, the founder of the modern hospice movement and St Christopher's Hospice in London, in her early writings: “You matter because you are you. You matter to the last moment of your life, and we will do all we can, not only to help you die peacefully, but also to live until you die.”