If you’ve ever had the opportunity to bring a 80+ year-old person with chronic illness into a primary care physician, you may have had an experience where you wonder if the doctor sees a a living, breathing human being there. What we’ve seen happen a number of times in our family with my wife’s 87-year-old mom, who has several chronic illnesses, is a very narrow questioning by the physician that doesn’t really take quality of life into concern at all. This is by no means an isolated incident. But after one of these incidents, you can see how physicians and senior services professionals could work so much closer together in managing chronic care and improving quality of life to the end of life. For a look at this emerging future, check out Jane Brody’s articles today in the N.Y. Times on the new Martha Stewart Center for Living (we need this in Minnesota).