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 Death in America (Page 2)
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geedel Member Posts: 13 |
posted 07-09-2000 06:01 PM
  
quote: Unfortunately, it's too late for all that. The son is unable to speak or follow a conversation for more than a few moments. He communicates by blinking his eyes to alphabet listing. His MS has severely damaged his memory. Your suggestions are irrelevant to the situation. They merely bear out what I said in the previous post: We tend to believe that something can always be done to improve the situation. And most of the time, we're thinking of our situation, our ethics, our beliefs -- not the needs and desires of the interminably dying. |
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Stamm44 Moderator Posts: 63 |
posted 07-10-2000 10:18 AM
[QUOTE]Originally posted by geedel: >>"Whoever thinks the Kevorkian solution is "quick and easy" hasn't been there. It is difficult and heart rending for both persons involved. It's sole virtue is rationality. Likewise, the idea that the Kevorkian solution isn't a dying process of its own kind, hasn't been there."<< geedel, I am sure that you have chosen your words carefully and thoughtfully, but I would still take issue with you. While the Kevorkian approach may not in fact be quick and easy, the appearance that it may be so is the selling point for those, including family members, who see no alternatives between a lingering and lonely death and direct action to hasten the inevitable. There have to be better ways, and the hospice and palliative approach is the way I owuld prefer for myself. Yes it can always be improved, but there's a fundamental approach that appeals to me. [This message has been edited by Stamm44 (edited 09-13-2000).] |
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michael5070 Member Posts: 18 |
posted 07-11-2000 09:07 AM
quote: geedel, |
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Suni Member Posts: 7 |
posted 09-11-2000 04:15 AM
quote: Why not both? Why not hospice or other care for as long as the patient wants it, and then possibly assisted suicide if and when the patient wants that? I certainly know of situations where I would choose assisted suicide if that were available to me -- and my husband knows how I feel, should I not be able to speak for myself. Otherwise, hospice care is a wonderful thing to have and we need to make sure it is available to any who want and need it. |
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Suni Member Posts: 7 |
posted 09-11-2000 04:27 AM
quote: Good grief, if it were me laying on my death bed, I won't be thinking or caring about "highly complex questions". I would be thinking about my own death and that I was ready for it. Everyone is different and I believe each individual's wishes for themselves should be respected. That isn't the case today. Doctor's decide that some are too old for specific treatments that the patient may want. Poor people are at a terrible disadvantage. Decisions about who gets a transplant are not always made on who is the best "match" but which patient has the best chances overall, even tho they desperately want the transplant. Maybe that all makes sense, but as long as the medical community tells some people that they have to die - for what they see as very good reasons - then let us all have the freedom to decide for ourselves when we choose to go. There is room for individual choice in the US, or at least I hope that there is. |
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Suni Member Posts: 7 |
posted 09-11-2000 04:40 AM
quote: Good grief, if it were me laying on my death bed, I won't be thinking or caring about "highly complex questions". I would be thinking about my own death and that I was ready for it. Everyone is different and I believe each individual's wishes for themselves should be respected. That isn't the case today. Doctor's decide that some are too old for specific treatments that the patient may want. Poor people are at a terrible disadvantage. Decisions about who gets a transplant are not always made on who is the best "match" but which patient has the best chances overall, even tho they desperately want the transplant. Maybe that all makes sense, but as long as the medical community tells some people that they have to die - for what they see as very good reasons - then let us all have the freedom to decide for ourselves when we choose to go. There is room for individual choice in the US, or at least I hope that there is. |
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smkatow New Member Posts: 1 |
posted 09-13-2000 08:07 AM
When your family is in the hospital and is facing a life threatening situation; it is not the time to be fighting doctors. You are the person's family, you have talked about what should be done. Just because that doesn't go along with what the doctor wants, doesn't matter. Doctors are not GODS. They are high priced servants. Their function is to do what they are trained to do, when you need them. Their profession is a highly skilled profession, that is why we are willing to pay them as much as we do. But, make no mistake, they are there to do what you want them to do, not what they think is best. I am what is called a change of life baby. This means my folks were older when I was born (mother 48 and my father 50). My siblings were not around as the folk's health started to go down hill. So I was the one that learned to deal with the doctors and hospitals as I got older. My fathers health was good until he got cancer and died as a result of it, 12 yrs ago. But, for over 20 years, I watched doctors try and tell my mother what they thought was best for her. My mother was not a healthy women. She had more than one battle with cancer and lung dieseases of various sorts. More than once I heard doctors tell her, not to go through with a surgery. That she wouldn't make it. That she should just enjoy what time she had left. Some doctors would be visibly upset when she told them that she wanted to go through with the surgery. Some of them actually refused to do the surgery themselves. If my folks were not scared enough already because my mother had a life threatening situation, to be told by the doctor he refuses to operate. When someone is facing a life threatening situation is not the time for the high price servant to refuse to do their job. My mother was a fighter and always beat the odds and came through these futile surgeries. I have heard so many callus remarks by doctors it makes me sick. More than one of them, had let my mother know that they were surprised she was still alive, as she lay in ICU after a surgery. My mother went through 7 life threathening situations, during my lifetime. She passed in 1998 at the age of 78. She was a great grandmother many times over, and she got to see the birth of her only grand daughter (my daughter) and spend four wonderful years with her. None of this would have been possible if she had given up and not went through the cancer treatments or lung surgeries, like so many of the doctors advised her to do. My opinion, on death in America is: Death is in the hands of God. Not doctors! They should do what they are paid to do, and leave their ego's at the hospital entrance. That once the patient has made their choice, the doctors should just do their job and keep their opinions about that choice to themselves. And if they are surprised that a patient made it though the night, for God's sake don't tell the patient that!!! Sandra My opinion about doctor's is in no way a reflection of the nursing staff. You nurses are wonderful!!! The care and compassion the doctor's lack, you nurse out there have in abundance! More than one nurse has hugged and/or held my mother after as callus remark by a doctor. |
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raustin Member Posts: 2 |
posted 09-13-2000 01:09 PM
quote: |
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raustin Member Posts: 2 |
posted 09-13-2000 01:15 PM
quote: Thanks for this. When my mother died she, like many patients, entered hospice too late to reap the full benefit to her and our family. But if we hadn't early on in her illness sat down together and talked about all the outcomes and what she wanted from them, it would have been so much harder for all of us. By the end, we knew not only what she wanted in terms of medical care, but what she wanted to happen after her death...funeral plans, tissue donation (a subject often overlooked in end-of-life planning and discussions), etc. It gave us great comfort to be able to follow her wishes. While there are exceptions, I think most families also find that true if those wishes are clearly known and talked about. |
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Earlyorphan Member Posts: 3 |
posted 09-13-2000 03:47 PM
I experienced what I consider a "crash course" in death in 1996 - when within a six month period I was intimately a part of the dying process of my grandmother (alzheimers) my father (lung cancer) my mother (multiple myeloma) and a 42 yr. old friend (brain cancer). One of the hardest things was that most people aren't ever part of a real dying process anymore, and so their notions of how death moves come from T.V. or movies or infrequent visits into the realm of the dying. While I tried to provide the best information I could to the people I worked for about the caregiving I was doing, I learned quickly that doctors are terrible at predicting the "when" of death, and many people in the workplace are terrible at accepting that there are forces beyond the control of human beings. It is one thing to miss an important meeting if it is indeed the final, dramatic, end it all deathbed scene - no one would dream of denying that to a person. But what if the deathbed scene drags on and on and on - far longer than any of those T.V. shows that lead us to expect death to "make an entrance" and then have the patient make a quick exit. The thing I think America most needs to learn about death is that the journey there is often long, zig-zagging, unpredictable, exhausting, uplifting, frustrating and terribly, terribly lonely. And anyone who gets involved in it with a loved one is going to have a terrible time satisfying the gods of work/order/efficiency/predictability and also the demands of caring for the dying. |
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carolesgirl Member Posts: 4 |
posted 09-13-2000 11:03 PM
I'm here in michigan, home to doctor Kevorkian, and I had a mother who died of early onset Alzheimer's disease, the same disease doctor Kevorkians first patient suffered from. While I am glad my mother didn't avail herself of his help for my sake, I certainly believe it would have been her choice and the only reason she may not have was the knowledge that it was illegal. I believe the option to choose ones own path should be open and without judgement from those who aren't taking the journey themselves. |
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sherylmcintosh Member Posts: 5 |
posted 09-13-2000 11:08 PM
Death is part of the judgment against Adam and Eve, whether we believe it or not. But God provided a way so that you only have to die once, and that you can be saved i.e., spend eternity with Him, John 3:16. Death is not something I want to do, but I really don't have a choice. Thank GOd He made a way for me, and I have the assurance in His Word that to be "absent in the body, is to be present with the Lord." |
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