Article Critique

Article Critique The article “Oncologists’ strategies and barriers to effective communication about the end of life,” was written by Leeat Granek, Monika K. Krzyzanowska, Richard Tozer, and Paolo Mazzotta and published in the magazine, American Society of Clinical Oncology in July of 2013. Since communicating with patients about the end of life is one of the hardest conversations that doctors face, the focus of this article was to explore what kind of communication strategies and barriers that oncologists face when talking to patients about end of life care (Granek, e129). The audience that this article is trying to reach is not just oncology doctors, but any doctor around the world, that has to deal with communicating death. These authors are part of different facilities and have different job titles. Granek, PhD is a critical health psychologist who studies grief, loss and cancer patients and their families. Krzyzanowska, MD, is a medical oncologist at Princess Margaret Hospital in Toronto. Tozer, MD, is an oncology doctor at Juravinski Cancer Centre in Canada. Mazzotta, MD, is also an oncology doctor in Ontario, Canada (Granek, e129). The connections of the authors show that they truly know what it feels like to talk to their patients about death and dying because oncologists have to talk about death every single day. The authors have cited 30 different references, most of which have titles that include oncologists communicating with death and dying. These sources show that the authors took their time researching and their references are pertinent to this topic. The purpose of this article was to explore many experiences of loss that oncologists have had. It was also written to discuss different strategies and barriers encountered when dealing with and talking about end-of-life concerns with patients (Granek, e129). The authors asked twenty Oncologists from three different adult oncology centers in Canada to complete the study for this article. When the

Cited: Paolo Mazzotta, et al. "Oncologists ' Strategies And Barriers To Effective Communication About The End Of Life." Journal Of Oncology Practice 9.4 (2013): e129-e135. Academic Search Complete. Web. 18 Sept. 2013.