euthanasia law for kids

[Dakota]

This is already legal in Belgium if you are over 18....

Belgium considering new euthanasia law for kids - WTOP.com

The reason I mention this is because I do think we are going to see a paradigm shift from a society that wants to provide treatment to prolong life, to one that that focuses on end of life comfort and care. Belgium, correct me if I am wrong, already has a medical insurance system in place that resembles (or is) a single payer system.

I have posted in the past that the last 90 days of my grandmother's life was not only extremely difficult for those providing the caregiving but also financially, and the cost to Medicare, every bit of 100K between surgery for brain cancer, numerous hospital visits and radiation therapy and what they didn’t pay went to a secondary insurance company for payment. She already had end stage CHF/COPD.

Here is another person’s story about her father’s last 10 days of life and a bill for over $300K – something that was reduced to around 68K. She asked a question I know I asked several times over the course of the 3 months my grandmother was just in horrid health. The cost of dying: It's hard to reject care even as costs soar - San Jose Mercury News

Was this escalating price -- emotional, physical and financial -- worth it?


One of the comments under this article says:

Why do we so often put our loved ones through a torment we would never inflict on the family dog?

Do you see the U.S. becoming another Belgium? (because I do) These articles are pretty interesting reading.

 

[kwillia]

We are most certainly headed in that direction. It was written into the ACA laws that keeping someone facing EOL comfortable will be the appropriate treatment over attempting to prolong life as deemed by the panels of folks put in place that have the job of deciding when it isn't cost effective to apply heroics.

It's not necessarily a bad thing as we all know people that were put through hell with heroics rather than letting nature take it's course. The problem is that this is a huge grey area and money will quickly become the deciding factor rather than truly looking at the case. We can expect the average life expectency to drop dramatically in the coming years.

 

[Larry Gude]

The problem is that this is a huge grey area and money will quickly become the deciding factor rather than truly looking at the case. We can expect the average life expectency to drop dramatically in the coming years.

Money is how we got here.

Once we accepted health care as a right, those private decisions became public ones and when something becomes public it becomes bloated, inefficient and exponentially more expensive.

Before, there was ever incentive for privacy, for dignity, for accepting that we are mortal. A by product of this was a market force keeping costs in line; the absence of a profit motive to keep the 'past due' going.


Now, there is every incentive to do everything possible, and MANY things that are merely possible insofar as it will, mercilessly, extend life for a little while longer at the cost of dignity, privacy and any acceptance that we are mortal.

 

[GURPS]

One of the comments under this article says:

Why do we so often put our loved ones through a torment we would never inflict on the family dog?

tough call ....

because there is less moral objection to putting down the family dog, than grandma ....
.... while I agree, people are different than family pets IMHO MODERN Medicine has created this mess .... what used to kill people, we save them, now they linger on wasting away in a wheel chair in a nursing home waiting to die ....

- give someone in a terminal condition enough drugs to feel no pain, if they die because the heart slows to much from morphine
- so be it
- and yes I guess technically you are 'killing' them just the same ..
.... maybe leave it to the person sick ...
... give them a button to push - with NO Hourly limit on drugs ....

some people are selfish, as long as that cancer ridden, pain racked body still draws an artificial breath, grandma is 'still alive'

 

[vraiblonde]

I think it's shocking that we allow our government to regulate everything about us, including our death. If we are in pain for whatever reason, why can we not choose to end it by having some nice doctor fix us up with a shot so we can go peacefully?

From a country that is all about abortion, no less.

It's just crazy.

 

[StadEMS3]

Logan's Run is coming- a future society in which both population and the consumption of resources are maintained in equilibrium by requiring the death of everyone reaching a particular age.

As an EMT I see it so many times where an elderly loved one is living with family and finally succumbs to a terminal illness without DNR orders and said family insists we work them to keep grandma around longer. It is sad to deal with.

Our 2013 EMS Protocols now give us the authority to pronounce deceased and or terminate resuscitative efforts. I’ll admit that new authority gave me the chills as I can legally end someone’s life if certain conditions are met…That is a huge responsibility as an EMT-Basic.

 

[Dakota]

I think it's shocking that we allow our government to regulate everything about us, including our death. If we are in pain for whatever reason, why can we not choose to end it by having some nice doctor fix us up with a shot so we can go peacefully?

From a country that is all about abortion, no less.

It's just crazy.

The saying... "save the trees and kill the children" rings true when our priorities seem so messed up as they are these days.

 

[Dakota]

Logan's Run is coming- a future society in which both population and the consumption of resources are maintained in equilibrium by requiring the death of everyone reaching a particular age.

As an EMT I see it so many times where an elderly loved one is living with family and finally succumbs to a terminal illness without DNR orders and said family insists we work them to keep grandma around longer. It is sad to deal with.

Our 2013 EMS Protocols now give us the authority to pronounce deceased and or terminate resuscitative efforts. I’ll admit that new authority gave me the chills as I can legally end someone’s life if certain conditions are met…That is a huge responsibility as an EMT-Basic.

Yes it is.... I had to call an ambulance, about a year before grandma died, when we were in La Plata one day. She simply passed out. Her blood pressure & heart rate dropped and she was slipping away. That should have been where her life ended. I know that sounds mean but she had numerous health problems and they pumped her with everything they had to get her going again including sticking tubed in her lungs. She survived - but she was never the same. The next 10-11 months, she suffered and the last 90 days, was extremely difficult to see. Once she lost the ability to swallow, we (well, my husband had to force it) had her moved to the Hospice House. I'm glad my husband forced it because I don't know if I could have not provided life saving measures when I knew they existed. It is hard to go from care giver to realist and put those words into action.

Now what happens if the DNR says a doctor has to call it? That is how my grandmother's was written until we put her under hospice care.

I dunno... the more I think of it, the more I think it puts EMS people at risk to be sued.

 

[StadEMS3]

Now what happens if the DNR says a doctor has to call it? That is how my grandmother's was written until we put her under hospice care.

I dunno... the more I think of it, the more I think it puts EMS people at risk to be sued.

We do what the official doctor signed DNR says we can do. Yes, we are worried about being sued. It's a sue happy world out there, that's why we stress document, document and document everything on our reports.

 

[Larry Gude]

We do what the official doctor signed DNR says we can do. Yes, we are worried about being sued. It's a sue happy world out there, that's why we stress document, document and document everything on our reports.

Which means the care you DO provide is degraded by the energy and focus and training drained away by the paper chase.

 

[ICit]

Logan's Run is coming- a future society in which both population and the consumption of resources are maintained in equilibrium by requiring the death of everyone reaching a particular age.

As an EMT I see it so many times where an elderly loved one is living with family and finally succumbs to a terminal illness without DNR orders and said family insists we work them to keep grandma around longer. It is sad to deal with.

Our 2013 EMS Protocols now give us the authority to pronounce deceased and or terminate resuscitative efforts. I’ll admit that new authority gave me the chills as I can legally end someone’s life if certain conditions are met…That is a huge responsibility as an EMT-Basic.

you do something I would love to do.... but cant.

on what you do!!

 

[BadGirl]

Yes it is.... I had to call an ambulance, about a year before grandma died, when we were in La Plata one day. She simply passed out. Her blood pressure & heart rate dropped and she was slipping away. That should have been where her life ended. I know that sounds mean but she had numerous health problems and they pumped her with everything they had to get her going again including sticking tubed in her lungs. She survived - but she was never the same. The next 10-11 months, she suffered and the last 90 days, was extremely difficult to see. Once she lost the ability to swallow, we (well, my husband had to force it) had her moved to the Hospice House. I'm glad my husband forced it because I don't know if I could have not provided life saving measures when I knew they existed. It is hard to go from care giver to realist and put those words into action.

Now what happens if the DNR says a doctor has to call it? That is how my grandmother's was written until we put her under hospice care.

I dunno... the more I think of it, the more I think it puts EMS people at risk to be sued.

My mom suffered a massive stroke where she was left without use of 1/2 of her body (she was paralized on one side of her body), she was unable to speak, unable to care for herself AT ALL. She lived this way for 3 1/2 years, receiving 24-hour care from her family and independently-paid nurses the majority of time (she was in two sub-standard nursing homes for a bit before we pulled her out).

Anyway, I was with her when she suffered a massive heart attack. She seized up and moved BOTH of her arms up toward her chest area. This is particularly noteworthy, because she moved one of her arms that was paralyzed, and which she'd been unable to move for 3 1/2 years.

I knew she was dying, but we (my wonderful sisters and I) had made a calculated decision that, if mom's health deterioted in any way, we would NOT do anything to assist her situation. No EMT, no ambulance, no nothing. She did not die immediately, but did linger on for a few days until she did pass. During this time, we did relent and had her transferred to the hospice unit at the hospital, but we withheld medication and food from her. She passed after three days.

After caring for her for 3.5 years, and being a witness to her general unhappiness at her physical limitations, I can say that it was a great blessing when she died.

I am so glad that I did not call 911 when she suffered her last heart attack.

 

[ICit]

My mom suffered a massive stroke where she was left without use of 1/2 of her body (she was paralized on one side of her body), she was unable to speak, unable to care for herself AT ALL. She lived this way for 3 1/2 years, receiving 24-hour care from her family and independently-paid nurses the majority of time (she was in two sub-standard nursing homes for a bit before we pulled her out).

Anyway, I was with her when she suffered a massive heart attack. She seized up and moved BOTH of her arms up toward her chest area. This is particularly noteworthy, because she moved one of her arms that was paralyzed, and which she'd been unable to move for 3 1/2 years.

I knew she was dying, but we (my wonderful sisters and I) had made a calculated decision that, if mom's health deterioted in any way, we would NOT do anything to assist her situation. No EMT, no ambulance, no nothing. She did not die immediately, but did linger on for a few days until she did pass. During this time, we did relent and had her transferred to the hospice unit at the hospital, but we withheld medication and food from her. She passed after three days.

After caring for her for 3.5 years, and being a witness to her general unhappiness at her physical limitations, I can say that it was a great blessing when she died.

I am so glad that I did not call 911 when she suffered her last heart attack.

 

[Dakota]

My mom suffered a massive stroke where she was left without use of 1/2 of her body (she was paralized on one side of her body), she was unable to speak, unable to care for herself AT ALL. She lived this way for 3 1/2 years, receiving 24-hour care from her family and independently-paid nurses the majority of time (she was in two sub-standard nursing homes for a bit before we pulled her out).

Anyway, I was with her when she suffered a massive heart attack. She seized up and moved BOTH of her arms up toward her chest area. This is particularly noteworthy, because she moved one of her arms that was paralyzed, and which she'd been unable to move for 3 1/2 years.

I knew she was dying, but we (my wonderful sisters and I) had made a calculated decision that, if mom's health deterioted in any way, we would NOT do anything to assist her situation. No EMT, no ambulance, no nothing. She did not die immediately, but did linger on for a few days until she did pass. During this time, we did relent and had her transferred to the hospice unit at the hospital, but we withheld medication and food from her. She passed after three days.

After caring for her for 3.5 years, and being a witness to her general unhappiness at her physical limitations, I can say that it was a great blessing when she died.

I am so glad that I did not call 911 when she suffered her last heart attack.

Afterwards... looking back... I am so glad my husband and I made the choices we made but OMG.... those days were hard as I am sure they were for you and your sisters.

 

[Larry Gude]

My mom suffered a massive stroke where she was left without use of 1/2 of her body (she was paralized on one side of her body), she was unable to speak, unable to care for herself AT ALL. She lived this way for 3 1/2 years, receiving 24-hour care from her family and independently-paid nurses the majority of time (she was in two sub-standard nursing homes for a bit before we pulled her out).

Anyway, I was with her when she suffered a massive heart attack. She seized up and moved BOTH of her arms up toward her chest area. This is particularly noteworthy, because she moved one of her arms that was paralyzed, and which she'd been unable to move for 3 1/2 years.

I knew she was dying, but we (my wonderful sisters and I) had made a calculated decision that, if mom's health deterioted in any way, we would NOT do anything to assist her situation. No EMT, no ambulance, no nothing. She did not die immediately, but did linger on for a few days until she did pass. During this time, we did relent and had her transferred to the hospice unit at the hospital, but we withheld medication and food from her. She passed after three days.

After caring for her for 3.5 years, and being a witness to her general unhappiness at her physical limitations, I can say that it was a great blessing when she died.

I am so glad that I did not call 911 when she suffered her last heart attack.

You are an awesome person.

 

[PsyOps]

Once we accepted health care as a right, those private decisions became public ones and when something becomes public it becomes bloated, inefficient and exponentially more expensive.

Will you explain what you mean by this? If health care is not a right, then what is it? A privilege? A luxury?

If I require care for an ailment, in the name of my ‘right to life’ do I not have a right to access to all those things that ensure my ‘right to life’? Isn’t healthcare an key element in this? If it's something we need (akin to food and oxygen), don't we have a right to it?

:shrug:

 

[Dakota]

Will you explain what you mean by this? If health care is not a right, then what is it? A privilege? A luxury?

If I require care for an ailment, in the name of my ‘right to life’ do I not have a right to access to all those things that ensure my ‘right to life’? Isn’t healthcare an key element in this? If it's something we need (akin to food and oxygen), don't we have a right to it?

:shrug:

I understand the questions you ask but my concern is that when you are on the bottom, not making the income, but getting several perks, there is little incentive to do more with your life. Hear me out....

People wonder why our jail population is so high and after thinking very long and hard about that fact, I have come to the conclusion that government is the cause. Our government says... you have children and if you cannot afford them we will help you out... therefore individuals have no sense of personal responsibility. Our government will give them housing, food, welfare and health care. If they go out and get a minimum wage job, they will not be able to have those things. If they marry the father of their children, they are also at risk of losing these perks (and I just listed a few). We have a serious and catastrophic break down of families today. No longer will women put up with minor annoyances and stay married when it would be better for the family unit knowing that there are several other options provided by the government and on the backs of tax payers.

 

[vraiblonde]

"Health" is not a right - it is a privilege. Therefore health care is not a right, either.

You do not have a right to be healthy.

 

[vraiblonde]

Expanding upon that, this is one of the big problems with our society: we think everything is a right.

I was born with no legs, don't I have a right to walk?
No.

I'm deaf, don't I have a right to hear music?
No.

I'm blind, don't I have a right to drive a car?
No.

My child has a severe allergy, doesn't she have a right to not be exposed to the substance that may kill her?
Well, no.

Health is not a right. Especially if you believe "rights" are God-given.

 

[PsyOps]

"Health" is not a right - it is a privilege. Therefore health care is not a right, either.

You do not have a right to be healthy.

If I am not healthy how am I able to pursue my right to life, liberty, happiness?

There are far more rights we have that are not specifically outlined in the constitution. And I’m not implying government needs to do things to ensure we are healthy. That’s not where I’m coming from at all. All rights are things you either choose to exercise or not. Owning and carrying a gun is an enumerated right, yet the government does not provide everyone a gun. Their job to protect these rights, not provide them. So, if I so choose to pursue a healthy life, it is my right do so and no one should be allowed to stand my way against that.