Ira Byock, a palliative care physician and emeritus professor of medicine and community & family medicine at Dartmouth's Geisel School of Medicine, is a public advocate for improving care for people living with serious medical conditions. He became involved in hospice during his family practice residency in the late 1970s. Throughout his career he has written about the ethics and practice of caring for seriously ill and dying patients for medical journals. Since the early 1990s, he has contributed op-eds to national newspapers and gradually began writing story-driven books for the general public. His books include Dying Well (1997), The Four Things That Matter Most (2004), and The Best Care Possible (2012).  More information is available at IraByock.org.