my patient passed away....

so it happened, my patient passed away. there's bound to be a first...and even though i knew she was deteriorating, her death was still unexpected. she was a sweet old lady with parkinson's, admitted for aspiration pneumonia and unable to eat 'cuz everything she tries to swallow ends up in her lungs (thus causing the pneumonia). anyhow, we talked to her family today and decided to put her in comfort care in a hospice tomorrow (basically stop all feeding and meds and allow her to die peacefully), and she didn't even make it. the nighttime MD found me (i happened to be on call tonight) and told me the sad news--she passed away at 6:30pm while i was at a meeting. =( i hope she's in a better place now.