When Television Gets Death Right: How End Well Is Transforming Stories About Dying

The article highlights how our organization, founded by Dr. Shoshana Ungerleider in 2017, is partnering with entertainment creators to transform cultural attitudes around end-of-life care through more authentic storytelling.

The Problem With Medical Drama Fantasy

For decades, medical shows have fed audiences a steady diet of miraculous saves and dramatic deathbed scenes that bear little resemblance to reality.

As Dr. Ungerleider told The Hollywood Reporter:

“When I worked in the hospital, I can’t tell you how many times family members wanted CPR on a patient because they saw people get chest compressions on TV and pop up the next day and walk out the door.”

This entertainment-driven portrayal of medicine has real consequences. Families arrive at hospitals with expectations shaped by television rather than medical reality, making difficult end-of-life decisions even harder. That’s why changing these narratives is central to End Well’s mission.

Building Bridges Between Hollywood and Healthcare

Our work wouldn’t be possible without our key partnership with the USC Norman Lear Center’s Hollywood, Health & Society (HH&S).

As HH&S Program Director Kate Folb explained in the article, End Well helped connect The Pitt with palliative care expert Dr. Ira Byock for the show’s first season. Now working on season two, the series has tapped into death doula expertise for upcoming storylines.

This collaborative approach brings together End Well’s vision, HH&S’s extensive network of medical consultants and entertainment creators’ storytelling expertise. It helps shows like The Pitt get the details right while maintaining compelling narratives.

A New Standard for Medical Storytelling

The Pitt represents what’s possible when entertainment takes end-of-life care seriously. The show tackles scenarios medical dramas typically avoid: organ donation decisions after an overdose, parents watching resuscitation efforts on their drowning child and adult children struggling with their father’s advance directive.

Working with experts connected through our network, the writers learned about “The Four Things That Matter Most,” the healing power of saying:

“Please forgive me. I forgive you. Thank you. I love you.”

Executive producer Joe Sachs noted how actor Noah Wyle brought this concept to life, creating what Dr. Byock called “tender moments and opportunities to help somebody heal on a much deeper level.”

Measuring Real-World Impact

The response has exceeded our expectations. Sachs shared a remarkable story:

“An emergency doctor posted in a group chat on a social media site, saying, ‘I was working a night shift in the ER at two in the morning and a 92-year-old woman with a heart attack came in and was not doing well. The family said, “You know, doctor, you can stop right there. We’ve been watching The Pitt and we’ve seen how much suffering can be caused by resuscitation efforts when there’s no meaningful hope, and we would just like to have comfort care.”’”

This represents exactly the kind of culture change End Well was founded to create.

Our research with HH&S found that people who watched television shows with end-of-life storylines were significantly more likely to initiate conversations about end-of-life care with family members.

Now, HH&S’s Media Impact Project is conducting a separate study examining The Pitt’s impact across multiple topics, with results expected this fall.

Beyond Entertainment: Education Through Story

As Dr. Ungerleider emphasized in the article, accurate portrayals serve a crucial educational function:

“More accurate portrayals of serious illness and end-of-life on TV prepare audiences of all ages with a clearer idea of what really happens and what options exist beyond aggressive intervention.”

The Pitt functions as what she calls “a master class in communication that viewers and health care workers can draw upon in their own lives.”

The show demonstrates difficult conversations, reveals the emotional toll on healthcare workers and illustrates how families can find meaning even in loss.

A Broader Mission for Culture Change

Our work with The Pitt represents one facet of End Well’s broader mission to improve how we approach death and dying in America.

By connecting entertainment creators with medical experts, death doulas and palliative care specialists through partnerships like our collaboration with HH&S, we’re working to ensure authentic portrayals across multiple platforms and formats.

The show’s commitment to depicting healthcare workers’ emotional reality particularly resonates with our mission. As Dr. Ungerleider noted, it:

“Doesn’t shy away from showing the moral distress and grief when physicians lose patient after patient.”

It helps audiences understand that:

“Healthcare workers aren’t emotionally detached from death. We have to find ways to process the grief and then move on to show up for the next patient.”

This recognition validates our belief that changing how we die starts with changing how we talk about dying.

Through strategic partnerships and collaborative storytelling, we’re proving that when television gets death right, it can reduce fear, promote informed decision-making and help families navigate loss with greater wisdom and connection.

Read the full Hollywood Reporter article here to learn more about The Pitt’s groundbreaking approach to medical storytelling.