{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,5,4]],"date-time":"2026-05-04T00:45:34Z","timestamp":1777855534024,"version":"3.51.4"},"reference-count":46,"publisher":"SAGE Publications","issue":"1","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2021,6,3]],"date-time":"2021-06-03T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1622678400000},"content-version":"unspecified","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nc\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["journals.sagepub.com"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["J Med Biogr"],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2023,2]]},"abstract":"<jats:p>Sir William Osler espoused a particularly idealized medical life that included the patient in the physician's worldview. Disease is not considered a monolith, only a reflection of one's broader health. Death, too, is configured as a part of one's being, not as a thing apart from life. The wholesomeness that characterized Osler's practice is well known\u2014however, his long discussions and thoughts on death have not been sufficiently analyzed. His clinical views have been hinted at and numerous medical historians have noted that Osler's worldview on death was avant-garde for its time, one in which he described finality not as a time of suffering and anguish, but as \u201csingularly free from mental distress.\u201d This essay contends with this simple view. This straightforward understanding becomes complicated when delving into such primary resources as Osler's Study on Dying cards, his writings on other medical conditions, and personal reflections following the personal losses of his sons Edward Revere Osler and Paul Revere Osler. This essay contends that the loss and the death he imagines is not one of peace, but rather, of horror and terror. Furthermore, the primary sources show Osler not as the paragon of flawless clinical acumen and reasoning, but a man of personal beliefs that were in conflict with views he espoused more publicly. The essay therefore reconceptualizes the common understanding of a stoic Osler, determines how death prefigures into Oslerian thought, and challenges the idea of an Oslerian simple death.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1177\/09677720211018974","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2021,6,3]],"date-time":"2021-06-03T11:20:16Z","timestamp":1622719216000},"page":"50-61","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1177\/sage-journals-update-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":0,"title":["The principles and practice of death: The Oslerian conflicted conception of dying"],"prefix":"10.1177","volume":"31","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-1519-1842","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Kacper","family":"Niburski","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Faculty of Medicine, McGill University, Montreal, Canada"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"179","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2021,6,3]]},"reference":[{"key":"bibr1-09677720211018974","volume-title":"The principles and practice of medicine","author":"Osler W","year":"1920"},{"key":"bibr2-09677720211018974","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.7326\/0003-4819-118-8-199304150-00012"},{"key":"bibr3-09677720211018974","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Cushing H. The life of Sir William Osler. Vol.  2.  Oxford:  Clarendon Press,  1925, p.  672.","DOI":"10.1097\/00005053-192602000-00067"},{"key":"bibr4-09677720211018974","unstructured":"Ari\u00e8s P. Western attitudes towards death from the middle ages to the present.  Baltimore, MD:  Johns Hopkins University Press,  1974, p.  58."},{"key":"bibr5-09677720211018974","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1007\/978-1-349-10654-7_1"},{"key":"bibr6-09677720211018974","volume-title":"Medicine and the reign of technology","author":"Reiser SJ","year":"1978"},{"key":"bibr7-09677720211018974","unstructured":"Ibid, 11."},{"key":"bibr8-09677720211018974","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.14198\/raei.2007.20.01"},{"key":"bibr9-09677720211018974","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1086\/352790"},{"key":"bibr10-09677720211018974","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.2190\/F31Q-592N-056K-VETL"},{"key":"bibr11-09677720211018974","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1093\/ahr\/122.4.1307"},{"key":"bibr12-09677720211018974","first-page":"95","volume":"13","author":"Osler W","year":"1907","journal-title":"St. Mary\u2019s Hospital Gazette"},{"key":"bibr13-09677720211018974","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1001\/archinte.1961.03620040001001"},{"key":"bibr14-09677720211018974","unstructured":"Bliss M. William Osler: a life in medicine.  New York:  Oxford University Press,  1999, pp.  8\u2013 10."},{"key":"bibr15-09677720211018974","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1017\/S0025727300002350"},{"key":"bibr16-09677720211018974","unstructured":"Bliss M. William Osler: a life in medicine.  Toronto, ON:  University of Toronto Press,  1999, p.  71."},{"key":"bibr17-09677720211018974","first-page":"510","volume":"16","author":"Osler W","year":"1888","journal-title":"Canada Medical and Surgical Journal"},{"key":"bibr18-09677720211018974","unstructured":"Cushing H. The life of Sir William Osler. Vol.  1.  Oxford:  Clarendon Press,  1925, p.  136."},{"key":"bibr19-09677720211018974","volume-title":"Day books and accounts","author":"Osler W"},{"key":"bibr20-09677720211018974","unstructured":"ANGINA"},{"key":"bibr21-09677720211018974","unstructured":"PNEUMONIA"},{"key":"bibr22-09677720211018974","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Cushing H. The life of Sir William Osler. Vol.  2.  Oxford:  Clarendon Press,  1925, p.  671.","DOI":"10.1097\/00005053-192602000-00067"},{"key":"bibr23-09677720211018974","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1258\/j.jmb.2007.S-1-06-11"},{"key":"bibr24-09677720211018974","unstructured":"Osler W.  Study of dying cards. Original copies digitized.  1904. Accessed shorturl.at\/lpwI8."},{"key":"bibr25-09677720211018974","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.2190\/Q16P-KLJX-AC21-DDVP"},{"key":"bibr26-09677720211018974","unstructured":"Osler W.  Study of dying cards. Original copies digitized.  1904. Accessed https:\/\/bit.ly\/3aJotFa. Card 142."},{"key":"bibr27-09677720211018974","unstructured":"Osler W.  Study of dying cards. Original copies digitized.  1904. Accessed https:\/\/bit.ly\/3aJotFa. Card 5."},{"key":"bibr28-09677720211018974","unstructured":"Osler W.  Study of dying cards. Original copies digitized.  1904. https:\/\/bit.ly\/3aJotFa. Card 21."},{"key":"bibr29-09677720211018974","unstructured":"Osler W.  Study of dying cards. 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