The Existential Dispatch, Issue No. 55

A Word from the Founding Director

This issue begins with a physician who built an ethic from the plain fact that we are alive and want to stay alive. Albert Schweitzer’s sentence sits well beside new trial evidence for dignity therapy, a review of the discrimination that follows a cancer diagnosis, and a week of films in New York that includes Allan King’s Dying at Grace, filmed in Toronto. From Oregon and Victoria come new rules that treat violence against health workers as a preventable hazard, which is how it should be treated.

Existential Thinker of the Issue

Albert Schweitzer

“I am life which wills to live, in the midst of life which wills to live.” — Albert Schweitzer, Civilization and Ethics (1923), chapter 26 (en.wikiquote.org)

Schweitzer was a theologian and organist who trained in medicine in his thirties and founded a hospital at Lambaréné in present-day Gabon; the phrase “reverence for life” came to him in 1915 on the Ogooué River, and he received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1952. His starting point is the clinical encounter in miniature: two lives, each wanting to continue, meeting in one room. When we remember that the patient’s will to live is as real as our own, our attention to suffering becomes an ethical act and stops being a task to complete.

In Academia

Dignity therapy reduces demoralization at the end of life. In a phase II randomized trial of 80 terminally ill palliative care inpatients in Portugal, published in Palliative & Supportive Care, demoralization syndrome was present in 12.1% of patients after dignity therapy compared with 60.0% with standard palliative care alone. cambridge.org

Cancer-related discrimination. A new scoping review in Psycho-Oncology by Agbejule and colleagues maps how stigma and discrimination follow people after a cancer diagnosis, a reminder that belonging is part of what illness puts at risk. medicalxpress.com

In Film, Literature and Culture

“The Dying of the Light: Death in the Cinema.” Anthology Film Archives in New York runs this series from October 28 to November 1 as part of the Reimagine End of Life initiative, including Frederick Wiseman’s Near Death and Allan King’s Dying at Grace, filmed with five patients at the Toronto Grace Health Centre. anthologyfilmarchives.org

Death of an Ordinary Man. Sarah Perry’s new book was the best-reviewed book of its week on Book Marks; Amy Bloom wrote in The New York Times Book Review that in it “death and life are seen and held.” lithub.com

In Healthcare (Global)

Oregon finalizes a broader workplace violence prevention rule. Announced on October 22 and taking effect on January 1, 2027, the rule extends prevention program requirements to home health agencies and home hospice programs and defines workplace violence to include threats, harassment and intimidation as well as physical assault. natlawreview.com

Victoria will make healthcare a regulated industry. The Victorian government in Australia announced the change together with $30 million for security upgrades, lighting, CCTV and duress alarms; in a recent nurses’ union survey, 74% of members reported occupational violence or aggression in the past 12 months. newshub.medianet.com.au

Funding and Grant Opportunities

MASCC/ISOO 2027 Conference Scholarships. Abstracts submitted for consideration for a conference scholarship to the Multinational Association of Supportive Care in Cancer annual meeting are due on December 16, 2026, ahead of the regular abstract deadline. mascc.org

Conferences and Events

APOS 2027, San Diego, March 17 to 19, 2027. The American Psychosocial Oncology Society conference, themed “Transforming Psychosocial Oncology Together,” accepts late-breaking posters until November 16, 2026; early registration closes on December 14, 2026. apos-society.org

Startup and Innovation Watch

Allswell raises $7 million for LGBTQ+ behavioral health. The virtual, insurance-covered service matches patients with therapists who are members of the LGBTQ+ community or screened for experience serving it, and plans to add psychiatric medication management in 2027; for SGDc, the open question is whether such models will extend to people living with cancer and their chosen families. apnews.com

To Close: An Existential Joke

A resident asked Schweitzer whether reverence for life applied even to the mosquitoes of Lambaréné. “Especially to them,” he said. “They are the only ones who never miss a ward round.”