planning AHEAD - Advance directives, Handling financial changes, Estate planning, and Arriving at Decisions for the end of this life by University of Wisconsin–Madison Division of Extension.

A helpful workbook including End-Of-Life Planning Checklist, Resources for Support, Starting the Conversation, Checklist Following the Death of a Loved One, Contacts List, Security Codes and Digital Accounts, and Important Document Locations. Content is American so does not all apply to Canadian provincial laws but provides a framework for being prepared for the end-of-life.

The FIVE Steps of Advance Care Planning by Advance Care Planning (ACP) Ontario.

Comprehensive information about how and why to have ACP conversations to help people and their substitute-decision-maker (SDM) prepare for future healthcare decisions.

Person-Centred Decision-Making: Documenting Goals of Care Discussions by Drs. Kaya, Steinberg, Incardona, Myers, Ailon, Chakraborty, Grossman, Perri, Wentlandt, You & Ms. Andreychuk.

A form outlining how to have Goals of Care (GOC) discussions with patients, which occur in the context of a serious illness and there are treatment or care decisions that need to be made. The aim is to align available treatment and care options with the patient’s goals and values.

In Hope for the Best, Plan for the Rest, Dr. Seow and Dr. Winemaker have combined their decades of palliative care research and experience in caring for seriously ill patients. They have harnessed the advice of thousands of patients to create a roadmap that every patient and family will benefit from. In it, they share the 7 keys to unlock a better illness experience and reveal stories, tips and exercises to improve your journey right from diagnosis. These two compassionate experts empower you with practical tools to take charge of your life-changing diagnosis and navigate the health care system with confidence, knowledge, and calm.

Life and death are a package deal. They cannot be pulled apart and we cannot truly live unless we are aware of death. The Five Invitations is an exhilarating meditation on the meaning of life and how maintaining an ever-present consciousness of death can bring us closer to our truest selves. As a renowned teacher of compassionate caregiving and the cofounder of the Zen Hospice Project, Frank Ostaseski has sat on the precipice of death with more than a thousand people. In The Five Invitations, he distills the lessons gleaned over the course of his career, offering an evocative and stirring guide that points to a radical path to transformation.

Weaving the details of her own experiences as a caregiver through stories of her patients, their families, and their distinctive lives, Dr. Mannix reacquaints us with the universal, but deeply personal, process of dying. With insightful meditations on life, death, and the space between them, With the End in Mind describes the possibility of meeting death gently, with forethought and preparation, and shows the unexpected beauty, dignity, and profound humanity of life coming to an end.

Dr. Karen Wyatt offers a yearly book list full of wisdom stories about how to navigate grief, loss, and mortality. See the complete 2025 list here:

JANUARY Grief is Love: Living with Loss by Marisa Renee Lee

FEBRUARY Care Boss: Leadership Strategies and Resources for Family Caregivers by Jennifer O’Brien

MARCH Being with Dying: Cultivating Compassion and Fearlessness in the Presence of Death by Joan Halifax

APRIL Resilient Grieving: How to Find Your Way Through Devastating Loss by Dr. Lucy Hone

MAY The Good Death: A Guide for Supporting Your Loved One Through the End of Life by Suzanne O’Brien RN

JUNE Living with Our Dead: On Loss and Consolation by Delphine Horvilleur

JULY The Art of Grieving: How the Arts & Art-Making Help Us Grieve and Live Our Best Lives, by Sheila Collins

AUGUST The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom

SEPTEMBER Influencing Death: Reframing Dying for Better Living by Penny Hawkins Smith RN

OCTOBER Breath Taking: A Memoir of Family, Dreams, and Broken Genes by Jessica Fein

NOVEMBER It Won’t Ever Be the Same: A Teen’s Guide to Grief and Grieving (and) What Does Grief Feel Like? By Korie Leigh

DECEMBER The Schubert Treatment: A Story of Music and Healing by Claire Oppert (Natalie Stomatopoulos)

The Canadian Hospice and Palliative Care Association offers a fulsome repository for grief and bereavement resources and services. Several are listed below with many more to be found on the website.

My grief

Bereaved Families of Ontario

Canadian Mental Health Association

The Grief Stories podcast is hosted by health care experts who interview real people and other professionals about their stories of loss, the challenges of grief and what helps find hope and healing.

Health care experts and guests write insightful blog posts about the experience of grief and supporting bereaved people after a loss.