Palliative Care vs. Physician Assisted Suicide

Guest post by Dr. Ty Meyer

Hospice of South Texas

There are times in our lives when everything turns upside down, when the world seems to be spinning out of control and there is no easy solution to fix it. Facing the prospect of a life-limiting or terminal illness as a patient or family member is one such time. In my role as a Palliative Care Physician, I am often called upon to help patients and their families sort through the complex medical jungle within which they can find themselves surrounded. After such a diagnosis, it is common for people to be swept up by the rollercoaster of tests, procedures, and proposed treatments where their sense of control is left in the dust. Many times this ride ends in remission or control of the disease, but for some it ends in a downward spiral of worsening function and symptom load leading to impending death. The former makes the ride worth the toils involved, but the latter may leave patients wondering if it was worth it.

As the reality of approaching death sinks in, it brings with it many uncertainties and certainly fears. Many of my patients are naturally scared, but when investigated further this fear is of suffering prior to death and not death itself. This may lead to requests for hastening of death or physician assisted suicide. Dr. Ira Byock in his book The Best Care Possible notes that “any serious request from a patient for help in ending his or her life must be seen as a red flag that signals either that a patient is suffering or fears uncontrollable suffering in the future.” Requests for physician suicide can be seen as a plea to provide reassurance of relief of pain and suffering and reassurance that they as patients will not be abandoned as they are dying.

Too many patients have heard, “I’m sorry. There is nothing more that can be done,” as they approach the end of their lives. The reality may be that the medical options for cure or extending life are exhausted, but there remains much that is available medically to afford patients comfort and to improve the quality of their lives. By receiving high quality palliative care, either while undergoing curative/life-prolonging treatments with significant side effects or through a hospice program at the end of life, patients and their families are able to both deal with the current circumstances of their medical condition and begin to prepare for the future.

As a Catholic physician, I am often struck by casual comments indicating the justifiability of physician assisted suicide in situations of patient suffering and prolonged dying. It strikes me because I believe the final stage of life is vitally important to the dying person as well as to their family and is the natural consequence of living. The days and weeks leading to death can be very fruitful and in many instances are a healing time. In finding relief from physical suffering, patients are able to address the emotional, psychological, and at times spiritual areas of their lives that go unnoticed when physical symptoms are poorly managed. Imagine the difficulty of healing a broken relationship with a family member or God if every breath causes a stabbing pain in your chest or if your nausea is so bad that the thought of food induces vomiting.

Our goal in Hospice and Palliative Medicine is to provide the best experience for patients and families prior to death, to diminish suffering and allow a peaceful passage into the next world, but never to expedite death as a means of relieving suffering. By helping patients and families understand their illness and what to expect as it progresses and by managing physical suffering, they regain some sense of control and are able to focus on what is most important to them at the end of their lives.

In reassuring patients that they will not be abandoned at the end of life, their symptoms will be properly managed and their fears of suffering are addressed, hospices utilizing quality palliative medicine skills can help negate the desire by some to pursue physician assisted suicide. It helps turn a scary and unknown time in a person’s life into an opportunity for emotion and spiritual growth and allows for healing of the fractured relationships that are a part of life.

 

[author] [author_image timthumb=’on’]https://ignitumtoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Untitled.png[/author_image] [author_info]Ty Meyer is 20 year convert to Catholicism.  He is married to Gabriela and has 4 children at home and 1 in heaven.  He is a full-time Medical Director at Hospice of South Texas in Victoria, Texas.  He spends his work hours seeing hospice patients at home and rounding in the hospital with palliative care patients.  At home, he enjoys watching his family as they grow physically and spiritually.[/author_info] [/author]

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3 thoughts on “Palliative Care vs. Physician Assisted Suicide”

  1. Perinatal Loss Nurse

    “Too many patients have heard, “I’m sorry. There is nothing more that can be done,” as they approach the end of their lives. The reality may be that the medical options for cure or extending life are exhausted, but there remains much that is available medically to afford patients comfort and to improve the quality of their lives.” Dr Meyer is so very right…too often, the poorly informed in Health Care perpetuate the fallacy that the end of aggressive curative treatment is the end of treatment when in reality there is a whole other realm of CARE, but it exists to provide comfort, not cure.

    As a people committed to life at all its stages, its so very important that we understand this and have a ready ability to explain it. Palliative Care is not “no care” it is comprehensive and professional and effective and should never be mistaken for stealth euthanasia.

    I have too-often seen well meaning pro-lifers reject any ideas of palliative care …as if aggressive treatment and loving people enough will prevent all death…that is simply not reality – not for adults and not even for the 25,000 babies who die of natural causes in the US each year.

    In my world, part of palliative care for families is for an excellent neonatologist to explain to a family that there is no further benefit to be gained from aggressive therapies – as a nurse, I cant even start to create a safe place for a natural death as long as the parents question their decisions and options. I thank God for the good Doctors I have worked with and I pray for the ones who are still struggling to understand how death fits into the practice of Medicine.

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