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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Chapter 6 — Letting Go.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What system did the U.S. join Europe in implementing in 1935?
(a) Social Security.
(b) Medicaid.
(c) The New Deal.
(d) Medicare.

2. Where does Gawande say he witnessed the most hellish conditions of his life?
(a) An insane asylum in Belgium.
(b) An elder home in India.
(c) A nursing home in the American South.
(d) A prison in Portugal.

3. How does Gawande characterize his exposure to death and the dying as a child?
(a) He had a grandfather living with him and saw his decline in detail.
(b) He was surrounded by rural poverty and high mortality.
(c) He had a period when a lot of his friends’ grandparents and relatives were sick or died in a cluster.
(d) He had almost no exposure.

4. What does Gawande say is the biggest difference between how people age today and how they used to age?
(a) They used to die much earlier.
(b) They used to be much more independent.
(c) They used to be cared for in multi-generational systems.
(d) They used to be much more private.

5. What was Thomas’ explanation for the decline in the death rate?
(a) Laughter at the animals was therapeutic.
(b) Sicker patients avoided the facility.
(c) The animals gave people stronger antibodies.
(d) He had given people a reason to live.

Short Answer Questions

1. When did Bill Thomas take over as director of the Chase Memorial Nursing Home?

2. What does Gawande say your chances of avoiding a nursing home depend on?

3. What percentage of doctors in Nicholas Christakis’ study overestimated their patients’ survival time?

4. How old was Sara Monopoli when she was diagnosed with incurable cancer?

5. When does Gawande say people started to go to doctors, instead of doctors coming to them?

(see the answer key)

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