TEN DODE OPGESCHREVEN

As a general practitioner, specialized in palliative care, I am often faced with confusion, miscommunication and lack of insight in the field. Palliative care in the Netherlands is driven by a misconceived notion of the quality of life. Can we afford to consider this notion to be the very essence of palliative care any longer? This thesis analyses and elaborates on two authoritative texts: ‘Near a Grave’ by Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard and ‘Three Forms of Knowing’ by Belgian philosopher Herman De Dijn. The former claims it is important to accept death as part of life in order to make it meaningful as well as the importance to connect to the narrative of a person. In a case study of palliative care in his aforementioned book, the latter shows how rationalization in modern society’s ethics leads to a narrow concept of human dignity.