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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What does Jewel Douglas say is her lifeblood?
(a) Holding her husband.
(b) Eating good food.
(c) Holding her grandchildren.
(d) Seeing friends.

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

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

4. When did Bill Thomas take over as director of the Chase Memorial Nursing Home?
(a) 1972.
(b) 1991.
(c) 1986.
(d) 1998.

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

Short Answer Questions

1. How does Gawande say insurance companies respond after the Nelene Fox case found insurance companies at fault for not paying for expensive treatments?

2. What does Gawande say Jewel Douglas’ death showed him?

3. What do the doctors from Uganda and the writer from South Africa say about American medical care?

4. How does Gawande characterize his faith in Hinduism?

5. What was Thomas’ explanation for the decline in the death rate?

Short Essay Questions

1. What effect did Thomas’ changes have on the residents?

2. In the metaphor of death as the enemy, which general’s philosophy does Gawande say patients should want to emulate?

3. What are the instructions Gawande’s father left, for the disposal of his remains?

4. What are the advantages and disadvantages of Gawande ending on a personal note?

5. How does Gawande characterize his faith in his people’s religion, and how does he describe his participation in the Hindu ritual for dispersing his father’s remains?

6. What was Bill Thomas’ experience prior to starting as the director at the Chase Memorial Nursing Home?

7. What definition of courage does Gawande arrive at, from his discussion of Plato’s Laches dialogue?

8. What stance does Gawande take on the concept of “assisted suicide” (243)?

9. What triumph of Gawande’s was Gawande’s father able to witness, in his declining health?

10. How does Gawande characterize his daughter’s piano teacher Peg Bachelder’s final days?

(see the answer keys)

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