Are you living with advanced cancer, heart failure, or lung disease? Maybe you’ve been taking care of someone with advanced dementia?

As a palliative care physician, I’ve seen how a serious illness like cancer, heart failure or dementia can completely take over your life. Between all the appointments, tests, and medications it’s easy to lose sight of WHY you are doing all these things.

You wish you could have a real talk with your doctor about the things that matter most to you. You wish your doctor would ask you about the quality of your life. But they don’t.

Believe it or not, many doctors never receive any sort of formal training on how – or when – to talk to you about the quality of your life in a way that’s actually meaningful to you.

That means you’ve got to own that conversation.

But how?

At How To Train Your Doctor, you’ll find tips for owning your healthcare plan, no matter what the future throws at you. I’ll help you understand what resources are available to support your quality of life and equip you with the skills to engage your medical team in conversations about what matters most to you.

If you find the posts here interesting, you’ll definitely want to check out the conversations happening over on the YouTube and Instagram pages too!

One last thing. I know it’s a lot to ask you to take the lead on a “big picture” conversation with your doctor. Although I wish I could help you through that talk in person, I do have something to get you started. It’s called the Goals of Care Conversation Jump Starter, and will give you the language to start talking to your doctor about your healthcare wishes. And hey – it’s free, so why not check it out?

Good luck out there – you got this!

Matt