Thursday, February 17, 2011

The miracle of life ...and knowing when that miracle of life is no more..





We refuse to let a dog suffer


Let those who wish, have the right to die in the arms of the one they love. It is not too much to ask and brings such comfort in those final moments of life....



The right to die..

Paralysed woman demands right to die

A 31-year-old woman who is completely paralysed and has been on a respirator since she was six, has demanded the right to die in a letter to the Swedish National Board of Health and Welfare (Socialstyrelsen).
Doctors are willing to help the woman and end her treatment, but the board remains sceptical to the woman's request, according to a report in the Svenska Dagbladet daily.

The woman was born with a neurological illness that has led to a continuous deterioration of her condition. In her letter to the board she writes that she would have suffocated herself if only she had been able.

"I can not breathe by myself. Not a single breath. I am not able to move at all," she wrote in the letter dictated to two counsellors at Danderyd Hospital in Stockholm.
The woman has asked the welfare board that she be allowed to be put to sleep so that she can die with dignity.

"It is my express wish that the respirator is turned off after I have been put to sleep," she wrote.
The 31-year-old's situation brings the controversial issue of euthanasia, and a patient's right to decide over their own life-support treatment, into the spotlight.

The Swedish Society of Medicine's ethics delegation argues that the woman has the right to decide whether her care should be discontinued, but has written to the welfare board to seek clarification.

"It is a difficult balance between the patient's right to say no to continued treatment and the deliberate action required to end life support," said Maria Jacobsson at the welfare board to the newspaper.

Locked-in-syndrome husband wants his wife to end his suffering...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/jul/19/locked-in-syndrome-die-dpp

There is also a video explaining the suffering of a massive stroke......

---------------------

A 54-year-old engineering executive who suffered a massive stroke and lives "locked-in", able only to move his head and eyes, today launched a legal attempt to allow his wife to kill him.

Tony Nicklinson wants the director of public prosecutions to give guidance on whether the Crown would press murder charges against his wife if she administered a lethal injection. The case could reach the supreme court in a landmark attempt to have the law on murder changed to allow for "consensual killing".

Nicklinson is not terminally ill and is not in pain, but he has said he expects to "dribble his way into old age" and is "fed up" with his life. In a statement placed before the court, he says he wishes he had died when he suffered a stroke while on business in Athens in 2005.

The former rugby player used to work in the United Arab Emirates and travelled across the Middle East and far east before he fell ill but is now fed liquidised food twice a day and almost never leaves his home in Wiltshire. He has stopped talking to most people as it is so frustrating to communicate using an alphabet board.

"I need help in almost every aspect of my life," he said in a statement sent to the court today"I cannot scratch if I itch, I cannot pick my nose if it is blocked and I can only eat if I am fed like a baby – only I won't grow out of it, unlike the baby. I have no privacy or dignity left. I am washed, dressed and put to bed by carers who are, after all, still strangers.

"I am fed up with my life and don't want to spend the next 20 years or so like this. Am I grateful that the Athens doctors saved my life? No, I am not. If I had my time again, and knew then what I know now, I would not have called the ambulance but let nature take its course."

His paralysis beneath the neck means he cannot kill himself other than by prolonged starvation, which he does not want to do, and he is not willing to risk his wife being jailed for life on a murder charge if she kills him. He wants the right to die at home with his family around him rather than travel to Switzerland to die where medically assisted euthanasia is legal.

Nicklinson's move is the most ambitious attempt yet to loosen laws on the right to die which have so far centred on reforming the assisted suicide law. His attempt to change the way the murder law is applied was branded "deeply troubling" by anti-euthanasia groups who fear it could leave disabled people vulnerable to being coerced into euthanasia.

"We have seen cases of assisted suicide and euthanasia where people have been coerced, involving disabled people who are made to feel they have become a burden on financial resources," said a spokesman for Care Not Killing. "We can't have a situation where a right to die becomes a duty to die."

Nicklinson is seeking a judicial review of the director of public prosecutions' stance on "consensual killing", and asking for guidance on whether it is always in the public interest to prosecute in such cases. If that fails he plans to challenge the Ministry of Justice over its application of the murder law.

In February, multiple sclerosis sufferer Debbie Purdy and her husband, Omar Puente, secured a statement from Keir Starmer, director of public prosecutions on the likelihood of a prosecution being brought against Puente for assisted suicide if he helped his wife to die.
But Starmer's statement, listing six mitigating factors against an individual being prosecuted for assisting suicide, does not apply to Nicklinson's proposed euthanasia because he cannot be helped to kill himself; he must be killed.

The DPP's guidance on euthanasia is "murder is so serious that a prosecution is almost certainly required even in cases such as 'mercy killing' of a sick relative".

A CPS spokeswoman said: "The DPP does not consider that specific public interest factors tending in favour of or against a prosecution for murder or manslaughter in these circumstances are required."

Jane Nicklinson, Tony's wife, told the Guardian: "It needs to be possible. Nobody is saying it needs to be easy, but it needs to be possible. Poor old Tony is suffering ... The law needs to be changed. It is the only way for Tony to get what he wants ... I get cross that anyone would question what we are after. He just wants what everyone else can do. Suicide is legal."

Nicklinson has two daughters, Lauren 22, and Beth 20, and they have watched their father become upset at his condition. He spends most of each day in his specially adapted bungalow watching daytime TV and painstakingly writing a memoir with the help of a computer. He also writes letters to people on the right-to-die debate. A carer stays overnight and helps him to move his limbs three or four times during the night.

"Often he coughs and he needs to have his saliva wiped or he needs to be repositioned because he has flopped over," explains a statement prepared by his solicitor Bindmans.

"Mr Nicklinson's situation is rare and tragic," said Sarah Wootton, chief executive of Dignity in Dying. "His request to die presents society with difficult questions, for which there are no easy answers. One thing is clear: the current law fails Tony Nicklinson and his family.

"The law of murder is primarily used to convict people who act out of malicious motivation and as such carries a mandatory life sentence.

It should not be used to prosecute someone who compassionately helps a person who is suffering to die at their request."

Test cases

By asking permission for his wife to be allowed to kill him with his consent, Tony Nicklinson is seeking a rethink of the law on murder – for which the current sentence is life. Motivation such as mercy killing is no defence.

If his stroke had left him capable of taking his own life and he needed his wife's help, he would have been wrestling with the crime of assisted suicide, on which law lords and the director of public prosecutions have recently provided rulings and guidance.

Last summer, the law lords backed the argument put by Debbie Purdy, who has multiple sclerosis, that it is a breach of her human rights not to know whether her husband would be prosecuted if he accompanies her to the Swiss clinic where she wishes to die if her condition worsens.

The DPP provided fresh guidelines on the public interest test. Tonight the DPP ruled out new guidelines for mercy killings, so Nicklinson faces challenging the murder laws through the courts.

Watching Grandma Die...

Dear Editor:

Recently, on the Editorial Page of the Calgary Herald, Paula Arab wrote under the heading'Watching Grandma Die taught me Lessons about Living'.

Her points: (in quotes)

1. 'Grandma held on for 8 more days after Doctor's predicted she wouldn't live more than 24 hours. It was ?brutal? for her and 'traumatic' for loved ones'.
                                                  
 My response: What about Grandma's feelings and wishes?

 Did she WANT to live that extra time under those conditions?

 If not, why did she HAVE to?

 Only because of our antiquated law and societies religious attitudes which deny us the Right to Die.

2. 'Nobody wants to die in an institution, die alone, be a burden to their loved ones, or die a painful death.' 'It is these fears and the sense of helplessness that drive the calls for Assisted Suicide.' 'Good palliative care will eliminate the demand for euthanasia' 

My response: Agreed, PROVIDED the patient WANTS to live under these conditions and PROVIDED society can AFFORD to pay for palliative care. There is a limit to financial resources ? few of the modern generation have yet accepted this fact.

3. 'Assisted suicide is a slippery slope that undermines the whole philosophy of palliative care. It has proven to be in the Netherlands and Oregon where assisted suicide is legal'.
    
My response: I challenge her to find one specific example of her expressed fear.

4. 'Assisted suicide is being reviewed and considered in Quebec. They should place their political attention and resources on long term and palliative care.'
  
My response: I salute Quebec on their forward thinking, and hope such rights will be passed. Regretfully it must also be then passed by the Federal Government, and probably take too long to be of benefit to my generation.

Respectfully submitted

Cam Mitchell, Calgary. (age 85)

http://www.publishaletter.com/editorchoiceletter.jsp?plid=25454

Dying with dignity...

http://www.dignityindying.org.uk/

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Elderly NHS patients' harrowing plight is revealed in report

Some elderly patients were given no help to eat or left in urine-soaked clothes, according to the health service ombudsman
An elderly patient
The NHS ombudsman's report highlighted 10 cases where elderly patients were not treated with respect. Photograph: MoxieGal/Alamy

The NHS is inflicting pain and suffering on elderly patients and ignoring their most basic needs, according to a report by the health service ombudsman which highlights cases where vulnerable patients were failed.

Some patients were not offered help with eating or bathing, and one was left in urine-soaked clothes held together with paper clips.

Older people too often did not receive the care, compassion and respect they deserved, according to the ombudsman, Ann Abraham.

Her report cites 10 cases inadequately investigated by the NHS, in which elderly men and women were treated appallingly, often towards the end of their lives. It details serious failings in how NHS staff managed the patients' pain, nutritional needs and discharge from hospital, often with disastrous consequences.

Her disclosures led to calls for the NHS to urgently overhaul its care of the elderly.
"These often harrowing accounts should cause every member of NHS staff who reads this report to pause and ask themselves if any of their patients could suffer in the same way. I know from my caseload that in many cases the answer must be 'yes'," said Abraham.
The 10 anonymous cases outlined in the report include:

• Alzheimer's sufferer Mrs J, 82, whose husband was denied the chance to be with her when she died at Ealing hospital in west London because he had been "forgotten" in a waiting room.
• Mrs R, a dementia patient, who was not given a bath or shower during 13 weeks at Southampton University Hospitals NHS trust. She was not helped to eat, despite being unable to feed herself, and suffered nine falls, only one of which was recorded in her notes.
• "Feisty and independent" Mrs H, who had lived alone until she was 88, was taken from Heartlands hospital in Birmingham to a care home in Tyneside but, when she arrived, was bruised, soaked in urine, dishevelled, and wearing someone else's clothes, which were held up with large paper clips.

• Mr C suffered a heart attack soon after undergoing quadruple coronary artery bypass surgery at Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals NHS trust. Trust staff turned off his life support machine even though his family had asked for them to wait for a short while longer.

The care services minister, Paul Burstow, said that the report underlined the urgent need to modernise the NHS. "The dignity of frail older people should never be sidelined," he said.
Leadership by frontline NHS staff was needed to drive out poor practice, he added. An initiative by the Care Quality Commission NHS regulator in England would start next month, Burstow added. This will see spot inspections by nurses to check up on malnutrition and dignity among older patients.

Elderly patients represent more than 75% of those cared for by the NHS, and 60% of those who stay in hospital. The ageing population means they form a growing proportion of the service's workload.

"The inhumane treatment of older people described in this report is sickening and should send shockwaves through the NHS and government. It's difficult to imagine us allowing any other group of people to suffer this indignity and neglect," said Michelle Mitchell of Age UK.
The Patients Association said the ombudsman's report was "damning". Chief executive Katherine Murphy said: "It is a sick joke that we have an NHS constitution that tells us what rights we have when being treated by the NHS, but it is clear that, to the majority of older patients, it is not worth the paper it is written on."

The association wants independent matrons on wards to check that every patient is being cared for properly, added Murphy, an ex-nurse.

Peter Carter, chief executive of the Royal College of Nursing, said the report should act as a wake-up call to NHS personnel and regulators. But he warned that staff reductions and the £20bn savings drive would affect frontline care.

"Where we have seen poor standards of care in the past, we have often found an underlying failure in ensuring safe staffing levels and the right level of skill. Just last week 80% of RCN members surveyed told us that they did not have enough staff to deliver good quality care to patients," said Carter.

The report's findings have been made public as Liberal Democrat leaders try to stifle a revolt over the coalition's NHS reforms. Party critics claim the reforms will increase health inequalities, make tracts of the NHS unviable, and simply provide profits for private firms asked to take on the task of commissioning care. New figures show the reforms will cost £1.8bn to implement.

The Department of Health yesterday revealed it had sought authorisation from parliament to set the money aside to cover redundancy payments, pension liabilities, and the penalties of breaking contractual obligations of the primary trusts.

But the political backlash poses the greatest risk for the coalition, as Lib Dem rebels attempt to raise it at their spring conference next month.

Privately many cabinet members have doubts about the politics of health reforms, if not the reforms themselves, and rejection of them by one wing of the coalition would increase those doubts.

Failings and missed opportunities


The other six cases outlined in the report:

Mr D
Advanced stomach cancer patient. Family found him in a "distressed" condition behind drawn curtains on day of discharge from Royal Bolton Hospital NHS Foundation Trust. Discharged with inadequate pain relief, leaving family to find someone to dispense morphine over a bank holiday.


Mrs Y
Died from peritonitis and a perforated stomach ulcer after GP surgery missed opportunities to diagnose an ulcer. Ombudsman upheld complaints about the Epsom and St Helier University Hospitals NHS Trust and the GP surgery.


Mr W
Suffered from depression and dementia, 79. Admitted to St Peter's Hospital, part of Ashford and St Peter's Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. His life was put at risk when the trust stopped treating him and then discharged him when he was not medically fit.


Mrs G
Aged 84. Doctors at her local surgery failed to review her medication after she left hospital, with "serious" consequences for her health.


Mr L
Parkinson's disease sufferer, 72, a "brilliant" architect who enjoyed keeping fit. Care and treatment by Surrey and Borders Partnership NHS Foundation Trust contributed to a "loss of his dignity" and "compromised his ability" to survive pneumonia.


Mrs N
Lung cancer patient. Doctors at Northern Lincolnshire and Goole Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust neglected to address the severe pain she was suffering.

Who cares for the elderly?

This week's report on the treatment of the elderly is a timely reminder that we must radically rethink the way we view the older generation, says Joan Bakewell.

We are far from seeing the old as valuable and deserving as much dignity and respect as the rest of society
We are far from seeing the old as valuable and deserving as much dignity and respect as the rest of society 
When William Beveridge laid out his plan for national social insurance in 1942, he listed five giant evils that the country faced: want, disease, ignorance, squalor and idleness. But if Beveridge were to come back today, and address the issues facing the old, he might well suggest five new giants: poverty, isolation, discrimination, injustice and neglect.
When it comes to neglect, we have seen the searing evidence set out by Ann Abraham, the Health Service Ombudsman, in a report this week. She found that hospitals were often failing to meet “even the most basic standards of care” for the elderly, discerning “an attitude – both personal and institutional – which fails to recognise the humanity and individuality of the people concerned and to respond to them with sensitivity, compassion and professionalism”.
The 10 cases she described were heartbreaking: one patient was not washed for 13 weeks, did not have her dressings changed, and was denied food and drink; another was discharged while covered in bruises, soaked in urine and wearing someone else’s clothes.
But while they were shocking, they came as little surprise.

 When I served as the government’s Voice of Older People, I received a steady stream of letters – often from the children of older parents – describing their distress at how badly they saw people being treated, their desperation at having nowhere else to turn.

 Sometimes, the letters were from the elderly themselves: pitiable accounts written in a frail hand on scraps of paper, citing their contribution during the war or the service they had given over a lifetime, bewildered that society should now treat them with such indifference.
In my role, I had no powers to take action. All I could do was forward such letters to others – the Care Commission, an MP, or Citizens Advice. In doing so, I was by no means confident that something positive would be done. I had a sense of being one in a circle of well-intentioned people, passing on reports of how bad things were.
What, in many cases, made things far worse was the second of our modern evils: isolation. This compounds the effects of the other four giants, because it means there is no one to share your story, to relieve your misery, to call in doctors, carers or neighbours when things get bad.

Among women aged between 65 and 74, 30 per cent live alone.

Over the age of 75, that increases to 63 per cent; for men, the figures are 20 per cent and 35 per cent. This is not necessarily a problem: I am one of those statistics, and like living alone. But I have a busy life, and a support network of friends. For those who are more isolated, it is easy to see how loneliness can slip into depression. Children who live far away may visit only rarely, and those of us who are busy cannot appreciate just how long the empty hours of the day can feel. It is not surprising that old people who are discovered to have died on their own at home have often been dead for some time.

There is meant to be a safety net: many people who are frail and immobile depend on carers visiting twice a day, which may well be their only sight of a human face. But there is a crisis in the social care system, with all too many instances of carers without adequate training cutting their calls to a few minutes, and not taking the trouble to offer some sort of friendship.

Moreover, there is often no system in place for the supervision of such carers.

 With wages minimal and turnover high, old people are at the mercy of strangers turning up to provide intimate personal care. It is humiliating and shameful. The victims of these two evils can suffer from levels of misery that are almost Dickensian.

Yet the elderly face other problems, too – three of which converge in the provisions of the new Pensions Bill, which we debated in the House of Lords this week.

The extension of the pensionable age to 66 is to be brought forward to 2020, and it is to be equalised between men and women. But while this corrects one form of discrimination – that women could draw their pension at 60 rather than 65 – it creates another, in that the quickened pace of this new equality comes at women’s expense.

 For the best of all possible reasons women now in their fifties took a break from their working lives to bring up their children. It required their making financial sacrifices, but those sacrifices were made willingly. The Bill penalises them for doing that, confronting them with having to wait longer than they thought to get their pension and with little time or resources to do so. All told, up to 2.6 million women could be affected.

The next great evil facing the old is poverty – which, in turn, is connected to discrimination. A higher proportion of women in the workforce have low-earning jobs, while pensioners from black and ethnic groups are more likely to be in poverty.

Many women are already struggling to do several jobs in order to provide for their families, and may well be caring for both their own children and their ageing parents at the same time. They are caught in a generational bind. And yet some of them – 33,000, according to government figures – face the sudden prospect of needing to fund up to a two-year delay in their entitlement to a state pension. They must wonder how they are to do that, given that they have no scope, no space, no time, no opportunity to earn a little more, to set even a little aside each week to ease the transition.

It is the gentle but implacable squeeze of poverty that gives rise to another of my modern giants: injustice.

Many of the old are already seized by a fear of what lies ahead.

They sense that they will get a raw deal. In their letters to me, one after another used the same phrases – “I have worked hard all my life, paid my taxes, cared for my family and taken few holidays – and yet now I am to be punished. It just isn’t fair!”

 There is alarm that many younger people think the old “never had it so good”, enjoying lives of comfort and ease while they are having to struggle with the changing financial situation.

 There is widespread bitterness among many old people that the young just have no idea, simply can’t imagine how anxious and distressed they are at not being treated justly. At the moment, there are more than 12 million people of pensionable age in Britain. By 2050, the number over 65 will have doubled, not just in the West but across the planet. That will bring an unprecedented social change – which is why we need to rethink totally the way we view the old.

The fact that our population is ageing should actually be celebrated as a major achievement in the history of human development, due to advances in medicine, hygiene and lifestyle – most particularly the reduction in smoking.

Rather than seeing this phenomenon as a wretched burden on society, we should welcome the old as a major new resource, an extra generation fit enough to work longer and contribute to the economy which supports them, as well as a major market for new technologies and services.

That is the good news. The bad news – and this week’s report on the NHS endorses this – is that we are far from seeing the old as valuable, often capable and willing to work, planning carefully for what they expected their retirement to bring and deserving as much dignity and respect as the rest of society.

Yes, the economy cannot support a population that spends a third of its life in state-supported retirement – but there are millions of older people who have worked steady, responsible lives, caring for their families and honouring their communities, who expect to be treated justly as society adjusts to its changing demographics.

Many elderly people are alert and active, thoughtful and outspoken. They will be watching with keen attention how the public services, and our legislators, tackle the problems that lie ahead.

Baroness Bakewell is the former Government Voice of Older People. This is adapted from a speech given yesterday in the House of Lords.
 
 

Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Exposed: Shocking neglect of the elderly on wards of shame

By Sophie Borland
Last updated at 8:15 AM on 15th February 2011


Frail: The report cites distraught relatives saying loved ones have been completely ignored and their basic rights disregarded
Frail: The report cites distraught relatives saying loved ones have been completely ignored and their basic rights disregarded
Shocking neglect of the elderly is exposed again today in a damning report that claims the NHS is failing to meet even the most basic standards of care.
Complaints to health watchdogs include accounts of patients being left so dehydrated on wards they cannot even cry out for help.
Distraught relatives say loved ones have been completely ignored and their basic rights disregarded.
Frail patients are discharged from hospital when they are dangerously underweight while one elderly woman was sent home in another patient’s soiled clothes, held up by paper clips.
The shocking stories are detailed in an investigation by the Health Service Ombudsman, who accuses NHS staff of an ‘ignominious failure’ to care for the elderly.
Ann Abraham, whose job is to carry out detailed investigations of the Health Service, warns that the NHS is failing to respond to the needs of older people with care and compassion.
Her report concludes that doctors and nurses have a dismissive attitude and are apparently indifferent to deplorable standards of care.
It highlights ten appalling examples of neglect of the frail and vulnerable.
Its findings come just two months after the Daily Mail launched a campaign to end such scandalous treatment.
With the help of our generous readers we were able to raise £100,000 for the Patients Association to go toward a helpline to deal with complaints arising from similar cases of poor care.

 

Today’s report highlights how meal trays, water and emergency call buttons are routinely left out of reach. It claims at least five of the ten patients had not been given enough food or drink during their hospital stay. They were described as individuals who tended to put up with difficult circumstances without making a fuss.
‘Like all of us, they wanted to be cared for properly and, at the end of their lives, to die peacefully and with dignity,’ it added.
Ten cases that shocked the watchdog
Poor care or badly managed medication contributed to their deteriorating health, as they were transformed from alert and able individuals to people who were dehydrated, malnourished or unable to communicate.
Accounts from distraught relatives describe how nurses are too busy chatting to help the elderly eat their food.
Patients are not even helped to the toilet and are left for months without being taken to the shower or bath. Relatives themselves are also being ignored by staff and in one case doctors switched off a patient’s life-support machine against the wishes of his family.
Critic: Michelle Mitchell of Age UK said it is difficult to imagine allowing any other group of people to suffer the same indignity and neglect
Critic: Michelle Mitchell, of Age UK, said it is difficult to imagine allowing any other group of people to suffer the same indignity and neglect
Last night campaigners and patient groups accused the NHS of failing the vulnerable.
Katherine Murphy, chief executive of the Patients Association, said: ‘The situation is completely unacceptable. The NHS should always get these basic patient needs right. There isn’t an on-cost to this – it is an entitlement that every individual has a right to.
‘Attitudes need to change – older patients need to be treated with respect and compassion, not as an inconvenience.’ 
Michelle Mitchell, charity director at Age UK, said: ‘The inhumane treatment of older people described in this report is sickening and should send shockwaves through the NHS and government. It’s difficult to imagine us allowing any other group of people to suffer this indignity and neglect, yet we know this is just the tip of the iceberg: appalling treatment of older people in the Health Service is far too common.
‘This is not only a damning indictment of our health service, but of our society in general, where older people count for less and damaging discriminatory attitudes against older people remain rife.’
The ombudsman deals with complaints that patients and relatives feel have not been properly dealt with by hospitals, GPs or other NHS services.
They are advised to raise their concerns with a hospital or surgery first, and if that is unsuccessful make a formal complaint to the primary care trust. They can also contact independent organisations such as the Patient Advice and Liaison Service or the Independent Complaints Advocacy Service.
More than 9,000 complaints were examined by the health watchdog and almost a fifth concerned older people.
Care services minister Paul Burstow said: ‘This report exposes the urgent need to update our NHS.
‘We need a culture where poor practice is challenged and quality is the watchword.
‘The dignity of frail older people should never be side-lined.
‘Leadership on the front line is key to driving out poor practice.’



Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-1357087/Exposed-Neglect-elderly-wards-shame.html#ixzz1E1kxU0dO

Sunday, February 6, 2011

Should we be allowed to die with dignity...

http://www.squidoo.com/assisted-suicide

Videos: Passionate discussions on euthanasia

http://www.google.co.uk/#q=youtube+euthanasia+discussion&hl=en&prmd=ivns&source=univ&tbs=vid:1&tbo=u&ei=9XNOTcqcJY-54Aasv_CoCQ&sa=X&oi=video_result_group&ct=title&resnum=1&ved=0CDcQqwQwAA&fp=b0cdf0634d63cf14

Left to suffer..cases in history

http://www.euthanasia.cc/cases.html

Who gave you the right to decide my life ?

The right to die is a big topic in many places around the world. It is illegal in most countries and the cause of much discussion and debate, but who's right is it ?.

We as humans have let others decide how we live, the way we live and what we can do with our bodies,from prostitution to smoking pot, others have told us no you can't do these things. From wearing a seat belt to operating a boat we have been told what we have to do but the right to die when your dying already , who gave anyone the right to make this decision.

Religion is a large part of why assisted suicide is illegal. Religion puts it down as a sin and so it is wrong, well I disagree...first off i'm an athiest so the reasoning behind the religious debate is irrelevant to me. I don't care if your religion tells you i'm a bad person for believing if I was dying from a terminal illness that I can't end my life. I don't believe in heaven or hell . I don't believe in a supreme force and I don't believe that a cult has any rights, especially where peoples lives are concerned.

In 1991 a lady in Canada started a fight with our government over letting her commit suicide with the help of a doctor. Our government , in the end told her she couldn't, that she had to live with suffering and pain because it was morally wrong to end ones own life, Sue Rodrigas was her name and I say was... in 1994 after fighting not only for the right to die she also fought the suffering that goes with having lou gehrigs disease she ended her life with the help of an unnamed doctor . Bravo to her and the doctor.

Why would we want to make our loved ones suffer like thi ?. Why would the government want us to live hell-on-earth , perhaps money? the amount of money made from people with terminal illnesses is staggering to say the least. ..between medicine, hospital stays and doctor and nursing costs , it's beyond most peoples comprehension. ..add to that the idea that it is a sin and we end up with a lot of people living each moment wishing they could die, wishing someone would just let it end, wishing that if there was a god that he would end it for them.NOW.

It saddens me, it sickens me and it angers me that we as a society will kill our pets to end their suffering but we will let our loved ones live on in the name of so-called morals. Well I for one think that the only moral involved in this debate is money and power. In many countries we execute murderers but we won't let our loved ones die. In many countires we kill our pets when they suffer but we make our loved ones suffer . In many countries we are one messed up group of individuals.

http://hubpages.com/hub/the-right-to-die-whos-right-is-it

Pioneering research shows that terminally ill want to die at home

Terminally ill patients want to be cared for and die in their own home, according to Edge Hill's latest leading research.

As it approaches Dying Matters Week (15th to 20th March), the University's Evidence-based Practice Research Centre has unveiled the findings of a study it carried out to evaluate a pilot home care initiative run by Queenscourt Hospice.

The study found that 73% were cared for and able to die in their own home, whilst only a small number either died in a hospice/care home or were admitted to hospital at the end of their lives.

There was also overwhelming agreement from respondents that the service was having a very positive impact on patients, carers and health care professionals.

The Southport-based hospice had launched its own unique service that provides hospice care in the home setting, thus helping to allow patients who have chosen to die at home to do so.

The aim of the University's study was to explore health care professionals' views and experiences and to see if the unique pilot scheme was meeting its intentions of giving terminally ill patients more choice by filling in the gap in the care available to people at home.

During the year-long pilot study, data was collected from a variety of sources, including referrals and informal feedback from families and carers, focus groups, interviews and surveys with health care professionals.

Professor Barbara Jack, Director of the Evidence-based Practice Research Centre in the Faculty of Health, who lead this pioneering research project, said: "Within the UK there is a growing emphasis on increasing the options for service users particularly with a move from institutional care for patients with chronic and life limiting illnesses.

To increase the options available to patients the Queenscourt at Home service was initiated.  Our research was to determine whether it had actually set out what it aimed to do. The findings from our study indicate that the Queenscourt at Home service is having an important impact on patients, carers and health care professionals. The bespoke flexible service appears to be helping to have a major impact on allowing patients to die in their place of choice."

"Also, Dying Matters Week aims to encourage people to talk about their wishes towards the end of their lives and I think our research comes at a really poignant time because the service the Queenscourt Hospice offers is making a huge difference to patients who are dying."

A further study exploring the impact of this service on carers will also be undertaken now that the initial evaluation has been completed.

A full copy of the report is available at www.edgehill.ac.uk/eprc/reports


http://www.edgehill.ac.uk/news/2010/03/pioneering-research-shows-that-terminally-ill-want-to-die-at-home

People with terminal illnesses should be helped to die ....

People with terminal illnesses should be helped to die if they do not want to go on living, according to the chief executive of Liberal Judaism.

Rabbi Danny Rich made the case when he gave evidence last week to the independent Commission on Assisted Dying, chaired by the former Lord Chancellor Lord Falconer.

Rabbi Rich said: "It is morally defensible for an individual of sound mind to declare that the quality of his or her life is no longer worth the struggle. And that such a person may expect those who care - either personally or professionally - for him or her to assist in the process, and, subject to appropriate safeguards, those who assist should not face criminal prosecution.

"The truth is that humanity has never lived in an ideal world and, thus, we face trying to arbitrate between two rights: to live without being pressured into dying and to have the choice of when to die."

There were both legal and medical definitions of when a person was able to give consent, he said.

"It goes without saying that, if someone is unable to consent, it cannot be right that another person would say that the first individual's life is not worth living."

The Jewish peer Lord Joffe has repeatedly attempted to introduce legislation that would allow assisted dying in certain circumstances.

But the Chief Rabbi Lord Sacks has consistently opposed the prospect, arguing four years ago that "there are some choices we should not be allowed to make, and of these the most fateful is to decide that a life is not worth living".

http://www.thejc.com/node/44344

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfaylDGe0ac
MY CHOICE......A rose shall bloom as surely as it will whither and die...but she dies in her own time and in her own way......