Background: Hospitalists frequently lead family meetings with patients and family members. Shared decision making employed during family meetings is believed to foster mutual understanding of its participants, including understanding of prognosis. However, this assumption has not been empirically assessed. Methods: We performed a secondary analysis of data from a trial of a decision support tool [...]

Case Presentation: A 72-year-old male with a history of tobacco use (12 pack-years) presented to the hospital with 4 months of a progressive nonproductive cough. He experienced coughing spells lasting minutes with positional changes. The patient additionally endorsed night sweats, unexpected weight loss of 11 pounds, and dyspnea on exertion. In the days prior to [...]