Prue Leith and Assisted Dying.

[Jaichangecentfoisdenom]

I happened on this discussion earlier today, on LBC:www.lbc.co.uk/radio/presenters/david-lammy/prue-leith-makes-case-for-assisted-dying/ I've made it clear to my family that when the time comes, if I'm suffering from a terminal illness, I'm off to Dignitas in Switzerland - but I'm lucky, we can afford it. Religious reasons aside, what would you want for family and yourself?

That is your choice. But better to slip off unaware IMO than be in pain.

My dad was on end of life care for 13 month with 'frailty' following breaking his back in 4 places in a fall at the age of 80.

He was bed bound, doubly incontinent, loss most of his eyesight, was frequently in sufficient pain to require oral morphine and often hallucinating/delirious.

He regularly begged us to help put him out of his misery and tbh I'd have done it in a heartbeat if I hadn't my DD to consider wrt the repercussions.

I cannot understand why anyone would be against assisted dying.

Morphine or Fentanyl can't always stop the pain, a hospital pharmacist told me.

Sometimes there's nothing that works.

Where I live one of the criteria for a hospice bed is pain that can not be controlled in the usual way. They control it.

That's good if you can get access to that care - though I must say the hospital pharmacist was pretty experienced. Either way I think this thread has shown very clearly that that isn't always the case though @OutofEverything by a long shot.

End of life care should be better but it isn't in very many cases. What do you do when faced with someone who genuinely wants to die but is unable to?

I think that it's very difficult when you factor in the possible pressure by relations but in the end, and this too has some hard and unpleasant consequences, people's choice to die should be respected and if nurses/doctors are willing to facilitate that then it can go ahead. Medics need to be able to follow their own conscience here too, if they aren't willing to facilitate it.

I want to go before I lose my mind and/or control of my bodily functions and I don't want to live in constant pain and most people I know that lived into their 80s died in constant pain - I really hope we have decided to allow euthanasia.

What if your perception of the person's experience of death is completely unrelated to what they are going through and even the near-death experience does not provide any insight into the ultimate event?
You could be depriving people from assuming the leading role in some kind of personalized metaphysical extravaganza. That is just my opinion, of course, probably not widely shared.

Taking an infallibilist view, this is technically possible, if only because it cannot be definitively disproven. I mean, it's just as likely that you're depriving them of wildly distressing metaphysical torment that none of us have the capacity to comprehend. There's the same lack of evidence for both.

What seems considerably more likely is that the distressed, hallucinating patient with no control over their bodily functions and no understanding of where they are is experiencing exactly that. It seems incredibly cruel to subject someone to that just because someone wants to approach this like an A-level Philosophy question.

A close family member in their 50s has recently passed away from MND, diagnosed only 12 months ago.

Luckily they died peacefully in their sleep however there was no guarantee things would go that way, and would have just got worse by the day going forward so while we as a family are devastated I am actually relieved for them.

I'm pro but it's never straightforward. How can you force a doctor to kill someone?

I hope there will be much more public discussion around this topic to try and find the best solutions in the future.

I don’t want to live a long time suffering pain and misery. So I do support assisted dying.

But I am disturbed about some reports now coming out of Canada - people who could live longer, and want to, but can’t get the care needed to do so. But they’re approved for the assisted death programme.

It should never be a way out of avoiding proper care for people in need of it.

How can you force a doctor to kill someone?

you can't, that would be appalling. A doctor should never be made to do that! It has to be by free will only. If a doctor cannot be found then I'm afraid that the person would not be able to choose the time of their own death. In the NL there is an assisted-dying team for each region which covers a reasonably large area.

No sensible doctor would go through with it against family wishes. I would not want to be taken to court over this and others would feel the same. Grieving relatives have a skewed perspective on things at the best of times. Who wants to be accused of being the new Shipman?

You can't be seriously presenting that as an argument against.

Extreme pain (as I've witnessed, where the patient is screaming out of control, just for example) at the end isn't necessary to achieve that state.

ReleaseTheDucksOfWar
How can you force a doctor to kill someone?

Of course you cannot. If it's assisted suicide rather than euthanasia then the doctor would not be killing anyone.

Think of how it works at Dignitas, for example.

I was answering the previous poster, I don't for one microsecond think yiu can force a doctor to kill someone!

As I say, living in the NL I've known a couple of people go for assisted suicide. There is an area-wide team that steps ifa person's own doctor doesnt want to do it, and many don't.

The ones I knew had a dignified death under their own control, indeed through the assisted dying team.

The Dutch wouldn't just sign off someone who had dementia!

I agree with assisted dying. People who have no quality of life should be put out of their misery if they wish, like we do to animals.
It should be allowed here, I want to die at home, hopefully with my loved ones, not in a facility in Switzerland or The Netherlands.
I'm not religious and I do agree with suicide under certain circumstances. I want my dh/dc to inherit my money not have it wasted on care. I don't want a fuck ton of drugs wasted on keeping me alive at any cost either at the point of no return besides painkillers and the lethal injection.
I've had a full, active and independent life and I am only mid 50's by the time I am 70/80 if I get that far, I will have completed my bucket list and some. I hate hospitals and the thought of a care home does not appeal one bit.

Sorry! @ReleaseTheDucksOfWar I took it as a part quote from someone else and responded that way.

I firmly belive my body my choice as to when I die, sorry family and friends but its still my choice.

I do not want to end up being pumped full of drugs to keep me comfortable. No thank you. I dont want to be cared for so I can be shuffled room to room, no thank you.

So I am already putting. Only aside to take myself to dignitas.

If it means dying one or two years earlier so be it. Id rather go off my way then being forced to life in pain or with duck all dignity. And if my family and friends loved me they would respect my decision.

I am grateful for however long I have to experience this life whether it be 55 or 80 years.

So I fully support assisted dying. Let people go, easy for those who aren't suffering in pain or a terminal illness to say hang on for longer.

If only they pumped you full of drugs to keep you "comfortable" - it's not that easy - my Dad was in agony most days and my mother wasn't too far behind. Old age is far from a comfortable place to be, no one talks about it but from what I've witnessed a lot of it is bloody awful and I don't want to hang around just for the sake of it.

You can choose to state your wishes that when/if your faculties start to go you can be euthanised though. Which seems reasonable to me. It’s a choice that people should be allowed to make.

Some people want to live as long as possible, I have a great aunt who lived to 92 in the Netherlands she told me she was in pain every day but was a card carrying member of a society that declines euthanisation. She was British and had been a Pom Pom gunner in WW2; amazing lady. Sharp as a tack till the day she died.

Different people, different diseases, different choices. Is it so unreasonable that those of us who want to avoid a difficult end be allowed that choice?

Oh, my misunderstanding then. You were quite right, I was part-quoting from someone else, but read it as you thought I had said it :)

@Sadlifter The Dutch wouldn't just sign off someone who had dementia!

They certainly don't. Many - by far the most - people don't leave stated wishes that they want assisted suicide when it gets to a certain stage. Most people reach the end of their lives.

It works here because ime Dutch people will tell you ever so forthrightly what they think you should do, but they also respect that you make your own choice in the end. As a generality that is, there are always exceptions but this is the cultural approach ime.

Assisted suicide is a service available for those who want it, and it seems to be a gracious and respectful way of exiting life under the control of the person themselves, on the whole.

Exactly.

@Badbudgeter , I’ve seen more than enough of late stage dementia,,too, and IMO there’s too much ‘striving to keep alive’ - for what?? I did make clear to staff at my DM’s care home, though, that there should be no such ‘striving’ for her - she was already 89 when she went in - palliative care only - and they agreed, so the issue never arose.

Dh and I have added paragraphs to our Health and Welfare Powers of Attorney, to state that if we should develop dementia, or any other condition where we are both unable to care for ourselves, and speak - with full mental capacity - for ourselves, then we emphatically do not want any life-saving or life-prolonging treatment. We ask for palliative care only.

This is something that anyone can do.

I’m perfectly confident that dds will respect our wishes. However I gather that it’s often the relatives, not the medics, who ‘can’t bear to let mum/dad go’ and insist on treatment when quality of life is very poor or zero, and it would be much kinder (IMO) to let Nature take is course.

Hospital is in any case a terrible place for anyone with dementia, when they can’t understand what is going on or why, can’t remember any instructions, and will endlessly e.g. pull cannulas out.

I never suggested it as a general alternative. I do not have faith in pharmaceutical drugs and I do not use OTC medications. Therefore, if I wished to opt out of being doped up to my eyeballs at that stage then I should be allowed to retain control over that decision when assisted dying becomes fully legit and commonplace (which I fully expect will happen). The choice must always remain.

My local PCT has been failing patients for years and from what I have personally witnessed, they often decide to go down that route because the chance of an average patient in our area having a POA (or even an English-speaking advocate to successfully negotiate on their behalf) is low.