Euthanasia! your opinions needed please

Nurses General Nursing

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  1. Euthanasia/assisted suicide

    • 13
      Are you against it?
    • 59
      Are you for it?
    • 4
      Or are you undecided?

76 members have participated

Hi there I am a 3rd year nursing student. Our class at university have been asked to compile a debate for and against euthanasia/assisted suicide, our class has been divided into two groups and I have been placed in the group for. I have been appointed as one of the main speakers to argue our case and this is where I ask for your help. I would be very grateful if anyone can post their opinions on this matter and their reasons why? It can be for or against but because I am on the for team I would love to see if anyone agrees with it. I personally agree with some aspects of it but I am on the fence due to it being such a sensitive issue. The results from this post will be used in the debate but just the numbers of people not details etc... So opinions are very welcome thank you for reading, much appreciated.

I have been a nurse since 1982, but I signed a living will at age 18. I think you can see where this is going. I have also had the discussion with my son (only child) that I am not to be kept alive. And if I should have an incurable progressive illness, I WILL find a way to end it, as my state does not have a provision for assisted suicide. I believe in a choice, and no one should say when a person with an incurable illness has had enough. And it is NOT about physical pain (as so many say "with adequate pain control, people will not want to die"), it is about emotional distress, as I am very active and if unable to be active, life is not worth living to me.

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I graduated back in the 80's and even though I'm only 51, in my lifetime I have worked where they literally restrained non functional dementia type patients in bed so they wouldn't pull out their long term feeding tubes.

It made me sick, I didn't understand it at all and it felt unethical back then.

As a society I'm sure we all agree that it was barbaric. But it was really a mere 30 yrs ago. Wonder how we'll look back on this discussion of the terminally ill or those of us who would like to plan for those what if situations but were denied because it was deemed unethical, back in the medically dark ages of 2016.

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Specializes in Med/Surg, OR, Peds, Patient Education.
Terry Schiavo didn't have enough surviving brain function to "want" anything.

You are correct, she was in a vegetative state for years, something that she did not want. Upon autopsy it was found that her brain had deteriorated, and she was alive, I did not say "living," due to the fact that she only had brain stem function.

I would not want this for myself, nor would I want my family to endure seeing their, once active, wife and mother in that condition.

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Most, if not all, responders on this site are medical personnel, and primarily RNs who have had the sad experience of seeing patients kept alive, but not really living.

I am now retired, and have been for ten years. I am just short of being 80, and should I be terminally ill, and the quality of my life was poor, I would opt for euthanasia.

Not sure what your point is in posting this in response to my earlier comment. I, too, am an RN who has experience with people on life support with no quality of life and no known hope of improvement.

The point I was making was that I have debate assignments like this for classes in nursing school and grad school in the past, and if I had shown up for the debate and my contribution had been, "I asked a bunch of nurses, and they said they were (for/against) it," I would have failed the assignment. The instructors were expecting a lot more substantive research and argument than an opinion poll, even an opinion poll of healthcare personnel.

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Specializes in Only the O.R. and proud of it!.

Assisted suicide generally is such a sensitive subject for what I believe to be two major reasons for against: the religious generally believe that it is only for God to decide who dies and when and my second reason can further be split into two as well: what if a cure or other treatment is found and what about the ability to keep one comfortable with narcotics and/or other drugs.

there are two major reasons for as well (again in my humble opinion): what about diseases and disease progression that currently does not have a cure and onset can no longer be delayed and living will not simply be a burden on care givers, but painful and/or otherwise torturous to the afflicted? Like ALS, end stage terminal cancer, etc. and secondly, religious or not, don't humans have the freedom of choice? And shouldn't medicine as well as government not be controlled by any specific religious belief?

I, for one, would not want to live dependent on artificial means of nutrition and breathing, unable to move, maybe not in chronic pain, but certainly have periods of pain (if from nothing else, the inability to move). Think about the cramps you get when in a position of discomfort for any length of time as a person able to move and work it out eventually! What if you were stuck like that for hours, ne, days at a time. Unable to enjoy the simplicity of eating or drinking or changing the tv channel. Unable to speak or communicate. Vegetative state just waiting for the disease to progress enough for eternal relief. Sickening thought.

Yes. I am pro choice (even though I could never suggest a close loved one get an abortion) and I am pro choice for euthanasia as well. But one must be absolutely certain! The medical community must be absolutely certain that it is right for the person. The person must be absolutely certain of their wishes. Family should really be on board. Death is not reversible. One cannot change their minds when it is done. But one should not be subjected to a life of absolute misery.

You asked for personal opinions. Here ya go.

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Specializes in Med/Surg, OR, Peds, Patient Education.
Wait.... all that stuff didn't work and propofol did? Giving the benefit of the doubt, given what you describe, it seems there might have been a more thoughtful response to treatment in your account of a suffering patient. Again, and it's not a myth. Anyone can be made comfortable without the intention of killing them. That it hasn't been your experience isn't a demonstration that it's not true.

Being free of pain is only part of the story. The patient is a human being and must be granted autonomy, and choice. If the patient feels that he/she is losing autonomy, and the ability to live a meaningful life, shouldn't the choice to live or not live be that of the patient?

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Specializes in School nurse.

I am against it.

Allowing a peaceful and comfortable natural death and euthanasia are two completely different topics that unfortunately are confused a great deal. As healthcare providers we should be open to reduced or even no interventions but should never consent to actually cause death. We should educate the public and family members of options for great hospice care. We should advocate for hospice care and if we are not working in the hospice area we should appreciate and applaud those who do. Our culture needs to get rid of the fear and stigma of death but certainly not by intentionally causing it.

First do no harm

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Specializes in School nurse.

Also - regarding the Schiavo case - this was not euthanasia. This was withdrawal of life support. We need to be especially clear on distinctions such as those. It is confusing for lay people and we should be able to effectively and clearly communicate the difference.

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Specializes in Geriatrics, Home Health.

Mother Jones recently ran an article about the right to die, and it includes a pretty good summation of non-religious objections to assisted suicide. Objectors include disability rights activists, whose lives are often seen as not worth living, and docs who work with minorities, who question whether people who are already ill-served by the present system when they are at peak health should trust that system at the end of life.

i'm against assisted suicide because healthcare in the US is all about money, and death is cheap. It's one thing for a patient to refuse care, and another for them not to be offerd care because their insurance won't cover it. Will we end up with a system where, for example, cancer patients with private insurance are offered multiple rounds of chemo and radiation, while Medicaid and Medicare patients get 1 round, then get steered toward a morphine overdose? It has happened in Oregon, and a version of it is happening with Hep C patients.

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Specializes in Critical Care.
Mother Jones recently ran an article about the right to die, and it includes a pretty good summation of non-religious objections to assisted suicide. Objectors include disability rights activists, whose lives are often seen as not worth living, and docs who work with minorities, who question whether people who are already ill-served by the present system when they are at peak health should trust that system at the end of life.

i'm against assisted suicide because healthcare in the US is all about money, and death is cheap. It's one thing for a patient to refuse care, and another for them not to be offerd care because their insurance won't cover it. Will we end up with a system where, for example, cancer patients with private insurance are offered multiple rounds of chemo and radiation, while Medicaid and Medicare patients get 1 round, then get steered toward a morphine overdose? It has happened in Oregon, and a version of it is happening with Hep C patients.

I'm not sure what you mean by "it's happened in Oregon". I think there's general agreement that it should never be used to reduce costs through rationing, and currently rationing healthcare services is illegal since the ACA. Under that same rationale though, we should never allow people to refuse further treatment, since there's a chance they may have been encouraged to stop treatment by someone who could financially benefit from that. What makes a lot more sense is to prevent that from happening, while still protecting patient autonomy.

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Specializes in Critical Care.
I am against it.

Allowing a peaceful and comfortable natural death and euthanasia are two completely different topics that unfortunately are confused a great deal. As healthcare providers we should be open to reduced or even no interventions but should never consent to actually cause death. We should educate the public and family members of options for great hospice care. We should advocate for hospice care and if we are not working in the hospice area we should appreciate and applaud those who do. Our culture needs to get rid of the fear and stigma of death but certainly not by intentionally causing it.

First do no harm

Where physician assisted suicide is legal, a palliative care approach has to be attempted by at least some degree, unfortunately palliative and hospice care is not able to negate all suffering at the end of life, and in some cases is of relatively little benefit, despite being highly effective for most patient.

Our accepted position on balancing comfort and extending life/death is that we accept a shortened lifespan in exchange for comfort, assisted suicide is just further along on the same spectrum.

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Tomorrow marks the 1 year death anniversary of my Aunt and Uncle (aka Mom and Dad). She was a polio survivor and very dependent on her high school sweetheart, best friend and husband. 6 months prior, he rec a diagnosis of terminal lung cancer. This unfortunately sealed the fate for both of them. Being that he had been her caretaker from the time they were 18 (both were now 65) she knew that she did not want to be a burden on anyone in the family, so they decided to leave this world together. Both were too weak to make the journey to a "right to die" state which left them no option but to take matters into the own hands. on Jan 29th 2015, I received a phone call while I was at work informing me he had ended both their lives. They had taken the time to leave notes to everyone letting us know how much the loved us. I am very much a supporter of every state being a Death with Dignity state. NO ONE should ever have to endure what they did.... esp Him. If KY were a right to die state, they would have been able to die surrounded by family and surrounded by love. Unfortunately, their story made the local news as a murder-suicide which lead to public comments of hatred and ignorance. No family should ever be left to pick up the pieces in such a way as we did.

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