Hospice is a philosophy of care that provides care and support where people are most comfortable – at home. When care is needed for someone living with a terminal or life-limiting illness, it’s important to understand everything that hospice offers so to improve quality of life for the entire family. Being informed is the first step in making complex healthcare decisions and in experiencing the improved quality of life that hospice care offers patients and their loved ones. Often, these misconceptions keep people and their loved ones from getting the care and support they need at a time when they need it most.
Advance Directive information is available in the final section of the book also.There are many myths about hospice care. Clarity on the subject is available in The Final Act of Living. Pain management of the dying is a complicated, emotional piece for the families of a loved one who is dying. Something More about "Does Morphine = Euthanasia in the Dying": Sometimes the only viable option is to give enough narcotic to create a sleep state (induced coma) but not enough to stop breathing. However, I am a firm advocate of giving however much narcotic is necessary to lessen a person’s pain. There are too many ways that legal ability can be misused. That is the main reason I am against making it a legal option to end someone’s life prematurely in the name of comfort. Now the family can, BUT most of us are not strong enough emotionally to live with the decision to end our loved ones life prematurely, even if it is just by days or hours. The patient will not be able to say yes or no to such an offer. They are not in a mental place to make any kind of rational decisions. In the days to hours before death, legally offering the patient the option to end their suffering by an excessive dose of narcotic is really not viable because most people are non responsive. Now to your actual question “should a dying person be offered that choice (the choice to have enough narcotic given to end their life) and should it be considered legal? With our assisted death laws in several states it now is legal to voluntarily end your life sooner. I can do everything in my power and knowledge to keep you comfortable”. My answer, and I think I can speak for most healthcare professionals, is “I cannot do anything to help end your life. More common in my experience is the patient asking, not in the hours before death because they are generally non-responsive, but in the months before death to help them end their life. Our objective is to relieve pain not end a life. Most medical professionals approach intense pain at the end of life by giving what they deem appropriate to relieve the pain. I too have seen heavy doses of morphine given to end a life of suffering prematurely-but not often or on a regular basis. You have actually touched on a line of thinking that a lot of people have about the use of narcotics at end of life: that the narcotic is used to end life sooner than if dying were allowed to follow its natural course. should a dying person be offered that choice and would it be considered medically legal?Ī great question. I've also seen patients who ask for morphine to hasten the process. Most people do not believe that death is not painful. I've also seen doctors recommend it to "hasten" the painful process of dying. Dear Barbara, I have seen many dying "euthanized" or given fairly heavy duty morphine drips to allow "dying in peace".
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