Jessica Kaan, DO
Dr. Jessica Kaan attended Creighton University for her undergraduate education and received her medical degree from Des Moines University. She completed her internship and residency at Providence Portland Medical Center. She then served three years in the National Health Service Corps, providing high-quality medical services to the underserved population of eastern Puerto Rico, where she became fluent in Spanish. Her special interests include population-based healthcare and the integration of high-quality research and alternative medicine.
Dr. Kaan works as a hospitalist in southern Washington and circuitously became involved in end-of-life work. Her father is from the Netherlands, and his uncle accessed medical aid-in-dying (MAiD) in the eighties in the Netherlands, so it was always something she was aware of. Going through med school, the topic wasn’t touched on in her training, and when she began her clinical practice as a hospitalist, she witnessed many deaths, some painful and distressing. As she became more involved in end-of-life care, her patients often asked her about their options, including MAiD. Dr. Kaan could find few doctors in southern Washington willing to prescribe MAiD for patients. Knowing someone should be trained, Dr. Kaan traveled to California to train in MAiD. She now sees patients across southern WA who desire death with dignity. Dr. Kaan enjoys work as it is meaningful to be involved with patients in this way. Patients are best cared for by their own practitioners, and she hopes that in the role as EOLWA’s Medical Director, more providers will be prepared to support their patients’ choices.
As EOLWA’s Medical Director, Dr. Kaan will help to hone the talents of volunteer providers and will reach out to providers and encourage them to support the end-of-life choices of their patients. She will help coordinate services and ongoing opportunities for provider professional development, peer support, and networking. We are thrilled to have Dr. Jess Kaan join us as medical director; please extend a warm welcome.