Hastening death

[8thdaypriest]

 As far as  "I request physician assistance to END my life", this sounds like you are asking for active participation of a physician to end your life, AKA assisted suicide. This may not be legal in your state and to my knowledge is only legal in the states of Oregon, Washington, and Vermont. There is a huge difference in removing machines that support your life or giving you enough pain medications to make you comfortable and doing something to "push you over the edge." This is also a discussion you need to have with your physician ahead of time. Your physician may be ethically unwilling to treat you in the manner you wish. In that case, they are duty bound to transfer your care to a physician who is ethically comfortable with your wishes and is consistent with the laws of where you live. Living wills are good, but go one step further and find a person you trust and make them your medical power of attorney.

Removing machines that someone does not want even if it means the end of their life does not qualify to be considered assisted suicide. I always thought of it as returning someone to their "natural state," which means no machines doing what your body naturally does for itself be it breathing, feeding, pumping blood, or any other physiological function.

Terminology can be confusing and is worthwhile to become familiar with:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assisted_suicide

 

Thanks Photo,

Yes - I realize those things.  I WAS a medical professional. 

[Stan]

This is needed at the right time, yet the misuse scares me

 

Quebec doctors to get standard euthanasia kits as province prepares to legalize ‘medical aid in dying’

Republish Reprint

Sharon Kirkey | August 28, 2015 | Last Updated: Aug 31 8:53 PM ET
More from Sharon Kirkey | @sharon_kirkey

Phil Carpenter / MONTREAL GAZETTEDr. Yves Robert, right, secretary for Quebec's College of Physicians, speaks during a press conference with Dr. Charles Bernard, president-director general of the College, in Montreal, Tuesday February 3, 2015. 

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Quebec doctors will soon be given standardized kits with which to end the lives of patients seeking euthanasia — including drugs to calm the nerves and stop the breathing  — along with detailed instructions as the province prepares to usher in legalized aid in dying.

The Collège des médecins du Québec has developed a new guideline for doctors unlike any in the history of Canadian medicine: a step-by-step guide to follow before, during and after administering euthanasia to an eligible patient, including the type of drugs to be used, the dose, the injection site and what to do in the event of complications.

What will be inside Quebec's euthanasia kits?

 

• A sedative to calm the patient
• A drug to induce a deep coma
• A drug to induce cardiorespiratory arrest (two sets of each drug to provide a backup in case of complications)
• Syringes
• Needles in different calibre sizes
• IV tubing
• IV solutions

 

The guideline, which was developed in collaboration with the Order of Pharmacists of Quebec and the Order of Nurses of Quebec, will be available to doctors, nurses and other health professionals on a secure area of the college’s website. “We don’t want these recipes made too easily available to everyone,” college secretary Dr. Yves Robert told the Post.

In December, Quebec will become the first jurisdiction in the country to allow competent adults experiencing intolerable suffering at the end of life to request “medical aid in dying.”

Bill 52 allows doctors to administer lethal injections to mentally fit patients suffering an incurable illness and in constant and unbearable physical or psychological pain. He or she must also be in an advanced state of irreversible decline and be at the end of life.

“It is clearly not euthanasia on demand,” Robert said. “It is clearly not that.”While the Supreme Court of Canada did not define “physician-assisted death” when it threw out the century-old Criminal Code prohibitions against the practice in February, legal experts say the court opened the door to both euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide — where the doctor writes a prescription for a life-ending overdose the patient then takes himself.

The Quebec guideline could become a model for all of Canada once the Supreme Court ruling comes into effect in February.

Modelled on a formula used in the Netherlands, the Quebec protocol calls for a three-phase approach to assisted death via lethal injection.

 

First, a benzodiazepine, a type of sedative, would be injected to help control anxiety and “help calm the patient,” Robert said.

Next, a barbiturate drug would be injected to induce a coma. The third step would be a neuromuscular block, a derivative of curare that acts on the respiratory muscles to cause “cardiorespiratory arrest.”

The whole process, from beginning to death, “would probably take something around 15 minutes,” Robert said.

Some of the drugs are “thick,” he said, meaning they cannot be given by a “bolus” or “high-speed injection” and each require about five minutes to administer.

The guideline instructs doctors to watch for reactions, such as any allergic reactions or vomiting, and to be careful not to lose access to the vein. “If the vein is clotting, probably they have to remove the needle and find another route of entry,” Robert explained.The standardized euthanasia packages, specially prepared by pharmacists, will contain two complete treatments, in case a backup should be needed. Unused drugs must be returned to the pharmacy. Robert said the cost of the medications “is something surely less than $100.”

The guideline will be posted on the college’s website in French on Sept. 10, followed by an English version one month later. It will also be made available to every provincial doctors’ college in the country. A special Quebec commission on end-of-life care will ensure doctors in that province comply with the guidelines, Robert said.

He said the Quebec college of physicians looked abroad for guidance, including speaking with the first doctor in Oregon to prescribe a legal dose of life-ending drugs to a patient under the state’s Death with Dignity Act, which took effect nearly 20 years ago. “He told us there were some bad side effects,” Robert said.

Under the Oregon law, the life-ending medication has to be taken orally, and not injected. Patients have regurgitated the lethal drugs, or, in some early cases, “reawakened” hours, sometimes days, after swallowing them. In some cases, the time to death has taken far longer than anticipated.

We have to learn how to do this as best as possible

In Quebec, “We are talking about IV administration of drugs, so the effect is almost immediate,” Robert said. “In an oral route, it can take hours to have the effect.”

“We think there should be as minimum time as possible between when the act is begun and the effect occurs, to limit the effect on the patient, and on the family and friends.”

People requesting euthanasia can stop the processes at any time, up until the last moment before the loss of consciousness, Robert said. “This is why it’s so important before beginning the three steps that the physician checks, or validates a last time, the will of the patient.”

Under the guideline, euthanasia could be performed in a hospital, a palliative care hospice or the person’s home.

“Nobody feels prepared,” Robert said. “We are exploring a new continent.”

“But we have to learn how to do this as best as possible,” he said. “There is a beginning for everything.”

National Post

Edited September 1, 2015 by Stan

[LifeHiscost]

This is needed at the right time, yet the misuse scares me

 

Quebec doctors to get standard euthanasia kits as province prepares to legalize ‘medical aid in dying’

Republish Reprint

Sharon Kirkey | August 28, 2015 | Last Updated: Aug 31 8:53 PM ET
More from Sharon Kirkey | @sharon_kirkey

Phil Carpenter / MONTREAL GAZETTEDr. Yves Robert, right, secretary for Quebec's College of Physicians, speaks during a press conference with Dr. Charles Bernard, president-director general of the College, in Montreal, Tuesday February 3, 2015. 

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In Quebec, “We are talking about IV administration of drugs, so the effect is almost immediate,” Robert said. “In an oral route, it can take hours to have the effect.”

“We think there should be as minimum time as possible between when the act is begun and the effect occurs, to limit the effect on the patient, and on the family and friends.”

People requesting euthanasia can stop the processes at any time, up until the last moment before the loss of consciousness, Robert said. “This is why it’s so important before beginning the three steps that the physician checks, or validates a last time, the will of the patient.”

Under the guideline, euthanasia could be performed in a hospital, a palliative care hospice or the person’s home.

“Nobody feels prepared,” Robert said. “We are exploring a new continent.”

“But we have to learn how to do this as best as possible,” he said. “There is a beginning for everything.”

National Post

An observation has been made that no weapon of warfare man has made has not eventually been used for its' intended purpose. Just as the holocaust of aborted babies has been perpetrated by Planned Parenthood to solve a societal problem, so this legislation has been proposed for a good purpose. However unregenerate human beings will misuse it for selfish interests, and if Jesus doesn't come first, just as Hitler used Dr. Mengele to aid "The Final Solution", so this has all the earmarks of unregenerate man's devising. 

Even so, come Lord Jesus!

“Though the people of Israel are as numerous as the sand of the seashore, only a remnant will be saved.

28For the Lord will carry out his sentence upon the earth quickly and with finality. ^{...Romans 9}

^{God is Love!!  Jesus saves} 

 

 

 

[B/W Photodude]

However unregenerate human beings will misuse it for selfish interests, and if Jesus doesn't come first, just as Hitler used Dr. Mengele to aid "The Final Solution", so this has all the earmarks of unregenerate man's devising. 

It makes people very uncomfortable when you inform people that some of the inspiration for the holocaust was from Americans. Even JHKellogg, after he left the SDA church, was known to have met with some of the eugenics people from the NAZI regime. It has often been said that the way blacks were being treated in this country emboldened them in their schemes. I suspicion the SDA church in Germany was not that helpful in countering the outcomes in Germany.

[Gerr]

As a physician, I have removed tubes and disconnected ventilators on terminal cases upon family request. I had also stopped IV fluids and withheld further treatments, again on terminal cases.   I had no problem with that.  It was much harder to do to my wife of 47 years.   When the RN saw her condition, she asked me if I had ever thought of withholding the water (by this time she's had only one can of Ensure in two weeks because she has lost her appetite).  I had thought of withholding fluids many times, overdosing her many times.  Just putting a pillow over her face even crossed my mind.  I did not have the heart to do them.   I had been praying and expecting God to be the one to turn off the switch of life.  It did not happen.  Maybe I was waiting for someone to give me permission/affirmation to do what I have thought of before.  I had already been carrying out her Living Will wishes, i.e. no antibiotics, no iv's, no O2, no ventilators.  l discussed it with my son to withhold water.  In fact, my son said he would have done it weeks ago. I also explained to my wife what I was about to do, and she agreed. So I started withholding water 2 weeks ago except for just enough water for her to swallow her pain and anti-anxiety pills.  She finally went to her rest yesterday.  Yes, it is so much easier to give advice when it's about someone else.  It becomes a different problem when it involves your own family.  Is it possible that in His wish for us to participate in His divine nature, God is perhaps wanting us to gain an insight into the anguish that He must go through when He decides to finally turn off the switch permanently on those who refused His mercy?

Thank you all for your input and for your prayers.

Edited September 2, 2015 by Gerry Cabalo
add

[Stan]

Gerry, Dr Cabalo, I am praying for you and cheering for you.

 

Not sure life gets any tougher.  I ache for you.

[rudywoofs (Pam)]

oh (((Gerry))) ... what a hard time you've been going through..     

Be at rest.  Be at rest...

[phkrause]

Gerry will be praying for you and your family. By the way, a great post Gerry. I can't even imagine what you've had to go through these passed few years.

[Stan]

Gerry , remember you have a lot of friends here. LOTS.

[Gail]

((( Gerry )))  she is suffering no longer. She was blessed to have you

You did well. That is the hardest thing I can think of that life can dish out.

And your friends here in sympathy are all sharing your sadness. 

[LifeHiscost]

One never knows when an offthecuff comment may be destroying the last vestige of peace a person is promised from the Lord of their hope. You have held your heartache admirably Gerry. May the God of peace return you to your loved one when He at last sees this world has had enough pain and anguish.

 

3 And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.....John 17
 

11 ....Our friend.... sleepeth; but I go, that I may awake her out of sleep.....John 11
 

¹⁴ For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him.

¹⁵ For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep.

¹⁶ For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:....1 Thessalonians 4

God bless you, my friend, and your family.

God is Love!  Jesus saves! 

[Gail]

One never knows when an offthecuff comment may be destroying the last vestige of peace a person is promised from the Lord of their hope. You have held your heartache admirably Gerry. May the God of peace return you to your loved one when He at last sees this world has had enough pain and anguish.

Amen

[Aliensanctuary]

I wonder, if in the Resurrection, that those who have been close in this life will be resurrected in the same location, or, if they will have to try to find each other in a sea of young adults. I think that everyone will be the same age, then.

[Deaconess]

I am so, so sorry for your loss.   When my parents died, the only thing that

kept me going was the thought that they were no longer in any pain.    Being in

health care can be a blessing, but it also makes a death so much more painful 

when it is a loved one.   But, "We have this hope..... "       May God surround you

with peace and comfort.    

[JoeMo]

Gerry,

My heart goes out to you for your loss.  Take at least a little comfort in the fact that your beloved is no longer in pain; and sleeps with Jesus - unconsiously awaiting her reunion with you in the Kingdom.  May God flood you with His compassion, comfort and peace.  He will bring you through this.

[Gerr]

Thank you my friends for all the kind words and prayers!

[Naomi]

Somehow I missed your post; my heart hurts for you. I can only echo the words of encouragement from our fellow CA members, however I shall keep you and your family in prayer during this difficult time of adjustment. May our Lord send you peace and courage.

[Femster]

i also missed this post- my heart also aches, but i also take comfort in that Jesus will be the first thing she sees!!!

 

You absolutely did the right thing. 

Rest easy , and know that she was supportive of you, and that your family here on CA will hold you in their hearts, and prayers.

 

*hugs from across the miles in Australia*

[Lauralea]

I am so sorry for your loss Gerry. It sounds like you tried to do the right thing in a very difficult situation. May the Lord be with you in this sad time.

[Sojourner]

I was saddened to read this today Gerry, thinking of you my friend.