I think one of the cruelest things we do is let patients lay in nursing home beds without the legal ability to terminate their own lives. I'd be interest in what other nurses think of this.
If you ask active people who are in their 40s and alert and you say to them "when you get older and you lose the capacity to know your surroundings and you no longer recognize your family members, and if you reach a point where someone has to change your brief in a bed or feed you your meals, would you prefer to live your life like that or would you prefer someone terminate your life painlessly and peacefully?"
What do you think most people's response would be???
Mine would be termination of my life! But guess what that is against the law in most states.
I'd be interested in knowing what other nurses think about this. We get trained over and over again about abuse. Well to me, the biggest abuse we commit is we do not allow Voluntary Euthanasia over laying in a soiled brief in a nursing home bed where we can't even feed ourselves anymore. Voluntary Euthanasia is illegal in all states and PAD is allowed only in Washington, Oregon, Montana, and Vermont.
Errors are not intentional killing. Euthanasia is. Withdrawing aggressive care and letting nature take its inevitable course while providing comfort is not intentional killing. Euthanasia is intentional killing.
How is unintentional killing when the patient doesn't want to die better than intentional killing when that's what the patient wants? At least with intentional killing we aren't killing someone against their wishes.
If my loved one had a terminal disease and wanted to die by euthanasia, I would make sure to honor THEIR wishes no matter what I wanted. I think people deserve the right to die with dignity and painlessly. I would never force someone to suffer because I didn't like it. I don't understand how anyone could, let alone someone in the healthcare field.
I think both intentional and unintentional killing are to be avoided. Accidents are just that: accidents. No intent.
Deaths can't always be avoided, they are actually an unavoidable part of life. The deaths we cause still have intent; we know we're going to kill a lot of people, we just don't know who specifically. If our intent was to avoid causing any deaths we should board up every hospital immediately.
I also don't think anyone should kill themselves, but if they decide to, then they should take responsibility for that action themselves. Alone.
For me, the primary purpose of nursing is to ensure that people don't have to suffer alone and without anyone trying alleviate that suffering.
Look, you don't have to agree with me. But I have just as much right to my viewpoint as you do to yours.
You have every right to your viewpoint, I'm not arguing that you don't, just that mine is different.
What on earth did I say that led you to believe I think we can prevent all deaths? This discussion was supposed to deal only with people who are GOING to die fairly soon, it's just a matter of how and when.
Deaths can't always be avoided, they are actually an unavoidable part of life. The deaths we cause still have intent; we know we're going to kill a lot of people, we just don't know who specifically. If our intent was to avoid causing any deaths we should board up every hospital immediately.
****For me, the primary purpose of nursing is to ensure that people don't have to suffer alone and without anyone trying alleviate that suffering.***
THIS!!!!!
I advocate for my patients; if done right and they want to exercise voluntary euthanasia, add me to the list that has NO qualms about caring for the patient; they will get the best care before, during, and after the procedure similar to ones that had to be withdrawn from support.
I have also been involved when individuals were a DNR/DNI and dying...it was peaceful for the family because of the care before, during, and after the process that helped when death would be imminent to hours to days; to me it wouldn't be any different.
I advocate for my patients; if done right and they want to exercise voluntary euthanasia, add me to the list that has NO qualms about caring for the patient; they will get the best care before, during, and after the procedure similar to ones that had to be withdrawn from support.
I have also been involved when individuals were a DNR/DNI and dying...it was peaceful for the family because of the care before, during, and after the process that helped when death would be imminent to hours to days; to me it wouldn't be any different.
However...cojones are needed. Many healthcare professionals don't have this necessary equipment.
We euthanize our farm animals and pets because we don't want to spend the time or money caring for them until they die from their illness or injury.
As someone who recently had to euthanize my seventeen year old cat, I take great offense to this statement. I did what I did because she was suffering, not because I didn't want to care for her. I had her for seventeen years! I spent a great deal of time caring for her and money on her and in the end, why would I allow her to continue to suffer from an irreversible illness when I could end her suffering forever?
MunoRN, RN
8,058 Posts
How is unintentional killing when the patient doesn't want to die better than intentional killing when that's what the patient wants? At least with intentional killing we aren't killing someone against their wishes.