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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. How does Gawande characterize the hope of a cure that entices people into what he calls the multitrillion-dollar medical system?
(a) A lottery ticket.
(b) A rigged gambling table.
(c) A pretty fairy tale.
(d) A snake oil sales pitch.

2. By what rate did the death rate decline at Chase, after the introduction of animals?
(a) 42%.
(b) 15%.
(c) 20%.
(d) 38%.

3. What was the first place Gawande’s father wanted his ashes scattered?
(a) Sacramento, California.
(b) New York city.
(c) Cleveland Ohio.
(d) Athens, Ohio.

4. How much of Medicare spending goes to the 5% of patients who are in their last year of life?
(a) 15%.
(b) 25%.
(c) 33%.
(d) 40%.

5. What is the typical requirement for a patient to enter hospice care?
(a) Running out of private funding for a nursing home.
(b) Chronic pain.
(c) A terminal diagnosis.
(d) A life expectancy under six months.

6. How did Bill Thomas overcome the institutional inertia that might have complicated his plans to introduce animals?
(a) He kept his plans secret and hatched them all at once.
(b) He talked to key opinion leaders and got buy-in.
(c) He overwhelmed people with big changes quickly.
(d) He fired anyone who refused to go along.

7. What was the effect of Thomas’ first project?
(a) To lower mortality rates.
(b) To reduce medical costs.
(c) To increase resident satisfaction.
(d) To irritate the staff.

8. By what factor was the doctors’ average overestimation of people’s survival time inaccurate?
(a) 250%.
(b) 530%.
(c) 420%.
(d) 1,700%.

9. What does Gawande say the surgeon at the Cleveland Clinic recommended for his father’s tumor?
(a) Immediate operation.
(b) Waiting and watching.
(c) Palliative surgery.
(d) Treatment with radiation.

10. How many parakeets did Bill Thomas introduce to Chase Memorial?
(a) 2.
(b) 25.
(c) 100.
(d) 60.

11. How many varieties of chemotherapy did Sara Monopoli try?
(a) 3.
(b) 6.
(c) 4.
(d) 5.

12. What does Gawande say has provided him with the most meaningful experiences as a doctor?
(a) Helping patients deal with questions of ethics and the good life.
(b) Helping patients deal with limitations imposed by of mortality.
(c) Helping patients deal with questions of philosophy and the spirit.
(d) Helping patients deal with what medicine cannot do.

13. How does Gawande say the problem of care for the sick and dying will be solved?
(a) Through legislation.
(b) Through mass organizing.
(c) One person at a time.
(d) Through well-publicized cases drawing public scrutiny.

14. How does Gawande characterize the people who spend the last days of their life in the ICU?
(a) A failure.
(b) A tragedy.
(c) A crime.
(d) A malpractice.

15. What is the city in which Gawande set out to dispose of his father’s ashes?
(a) Patna.
(b) Varanasi.
(c) New Delhi.
(d) Jaipur.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Gawande say he connected himself and his father to, by scattering the ashes in the Ganges?

2. What value did Thomas espouse in running his farm?

3. What was the second place Gawande’s father wanted his ashes scattered?

4. What does Gawande say is the “third type of doctor-patient relationship” (201)?

5. How many oncologists does Gawande admit to providing treatments they know will not work?

(see the answer keys)

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