Communication as Comfort: Multiple Voices in Palliative Care
About this ebook
With an author team comprised of three health communication scholars and one physician certified in geriatrics and palliative medicine, this volume integrates the medical literature on palliative care with that of health communication researchers who advocate a biopsychosocial approach to health care. Applying communication theories and insights to illuminate problems and to explain their complexities, the authors advocate a patient-centered approach to care that recognizes and seeks to lessen patients’ suffering and the many types of pain they may experience (physical, psychological, social, and spiritual) during life-threatening illness.
About the author
Sandra Ragan (Ph.D. University of Texas at Austin) is Professor Emerita of communication at the University of Oklahoma. She has been studying communication and palliative care/end-of-life issues for many years, and has contributed to numerous volumes on the topic, including several in the LEA list. Elaine Wittenberg-Lyles (Ph.D. University of Oklahoma) is an assistant professor at the University of North Texas, and Joy Goldsmith (Ph.D. University of Oklahoma) is an assistant professor at Young Harris College in Georgia. Sandra Sanchez-Reilly (M.D., Colegio Mayor de Nuestra Señora del Rosario, Colombia) is an assistant professor of Geriatrics and Palliative Care and the director of the Palliative Care program at the University of Texas Health Science Center and the South Texas Veterans Health Care System in San Antonio, Texas.
