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Previous Volume 338:336 January 29, 1998 Number 5 Next

	Since this article has no abstract, we have provided an extract of the first 100 words of the full text and any section headings.

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By James M. Hoefler. 206 pp. Boulder, Colo., Westview Press, 1997. $25. ISBN 0-8133-2816-0.

Advances in medical technology, such as mechanical ventilation and renal dialysis, have increased the ability of physicians to prolong the life of patients who formerly would have died. Many patients greatly benefit from these developments, but as disease processes increasingly can be halted or reversed, the question whether life-prolonging medical intervention is always in the patient's best interest arises with increasing frequency.

Curing diseases and preventing death have traditionally been the main goals of modern health care, and doctors have only recently become aware that their responsibilities change beyond the stage at which death appears to be inevitable. In those . . . [Full Text of this Article]

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