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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Chapter 7 — Hard Conversations.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What diagnosis did Lou Sanders get after he had a fall at age 88?
(a) Cancer.
(b) Parkinson’s.
(c) Dementia.
(d) Alzheimer’s.

2. How does Gawande characterize the plot of a person’s health for most of history?
(a) A high line that ends abruptly.
(b) A series of dips followed by recoveries that approach the horizontal axis of death.
(c) A high line that runs flat then falls quickly.
(d) A series of minor decreases in a slow decline toward death.

3. What view does Gawande ultimately take, on the question of why we age?
(a) Things break down.
(b) Things are not well cared for.
(c) Things shut down.
(d) Things are degraded.

4. How does Gawande characterize the onset of treatment for his father’s tumor?
(a) As an opportunity to practice what he had learned to preach.
(b) As a test for what he had learned about mortality.
(c) As a tragedy that struck too early.
(d) As a punishment for not having taken better care of his father.

5. Of the people who died in hospice care in the U.S. in 2010, what percent does Gawande say died at home?
(a) 20%.
(b) 40%.
(c) 30%.
(d) More than half.

Short Answer Questions

1. How does Gawande characterize the decline of health for the majority of people who age normally with modern medicine?

2. What percent of Americans does Gawande say died at home in the 1980s?

3. What does Lou Sanders’ daughter Shelley compare him to when he comes to live with her and her family?

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

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

(see the answer key)

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