dopetalk
General => General Discussion for Everybody => Topic started by: Chip on February 03, 2016, 04:51:46 PM
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source: http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/families-smuggling-lethal-drugs-into-hospitals-so-loved-ones-can-die-nitschke-20160201-gmj0qu.html
Families smuggling lethal drugs into hospitals so loved ones can die: Nitschke
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People have smuggled lethal drugs into hospitals so their loved ones can die, Philip Nitschke says.
Three people smuggled lethal drugs into Australian hospitals last year so their loved ones could secretly take their own lives when nobody was watching, euthanasia campaigner Philip Nitschke claims.
The head of Exit International said all three patients were elderly people with serious illnesses when they took a lethal drug in their hospital beds. They were being cared for at the Royal Prince Alfred and Concord hospitals in Sydney and the Austin hospital in Melbourne.
In each case, a partner or adult child took the lethal drug to them in hospital, Mr Nitschke said. The patients had previously acquired the drug in case they wanted to take their own lives one day.
Mr Nitschke, a former medical practitioner, said the three people took their drug overnight while no hospital staff were watching. The next morning, their deaths were recorded with no suspicion about how they died.
"In each one of those three cases, there have been no questions asked. It's not surprising because they were very sick. The assumption was that they just died," he said.
The cases are now being used by Mr Nitschke in his workshops on assisted death. He said while many people fear they will not be able to take their own lives in hospitals or other institutions such as nursing homes, these recent stories show it can be done.
However, he warned that if the relatives were caught smuggling a lethal drug into a hospital, they could be charged with criminal offences including assisting a suicide.
Qantas crew approached Dr Philip Nitschke about two hours out of Sydney when a cancer-stricken passenger became ill.
Mr Nitschke recently tore up his medical licence after the Medical Board of Australia demanded he stop discussing suicide if he wanted to keep his medical registration. He has since continued his work with Exit International.
Dr Rodney Syme, of Dying with Dignity Victoria, said he had never heard of families assisting people to die in hospitals in such a fashion. However, he said the reports added to the case for assisted dying laws in Australia. If there were more options for people to end their lives when the time was right for them, he said clandestine suicides in hospitals would not happen.
Margaret Tighe​, of Right to Life Australia, said it was appalling that Mr Nitschke was promoting these deaths. She said the hospitals should investigate them and boost their security.
While spokespeople for the hospitals said they did not know anything about the deaths, a spokesman for NSW Health Minister Jillian Skinner said: "Any matter of this nature should be referred to the appropriate agency, the police, and accompanied by details and evidence of the illegal activity."
A spokesperson for federal Health Minister Sussan Ley said she was "disturbed by any serious breach of accepted or ethical medical standards and this certainly falls into that category".
"Obviously our department will need to obtain more information from the relevant health offices in both states before we could comment in any detail," her spokesperson said.
A spokeswoman for Victorian Health Minister Jill Hennessy would not comment on the reported deaths, but said the Victorian government was introducing laws this year to give people more choice about the kind of medical care they want or do not want in the event of future illnesses such as cancer or dementia.
The Australian Medical Association would not comment on the report, but Secretary of the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation, Lee Thomas, said: "It is unfortunate that any person needs to resort to drastic measures to relieve their pain."
"Overwhelmingly ANMF members support the right to die with dignity and many have been engaged in the dying with dignity movement," her statement said.
In Australia, For help or information call Suicide Helpline Victoria on 1300 651 251 or Lifeline on 131 114, or visit beyondblue.org.au
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So what is the argument for not taking ones life if you're sick, costing tax payers money, and not adding to the economy or to art or to anything like that? Is it purely religious at that point?
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So what is the argument for not taking ones life if you're sick, costing tax payers money, and not adding to the economy or to art or to anything like that? Is it purely religious at that point?
think of elderly parents with huge assets (like a house) being encouraged by their heirs to die ... it gets murky if it's not policed properly.
just one example ...
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Hmmm good point...
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Imagine being a doctor with the ability to end a patient's suffering, and probably not even face any legal problems from those actions, and you don't. And you just let that human being suffer.....
I think the family would be plenty pissed off at you for not helping. Would they sue you? Would they be mad enough to hurt you (physically)?
Back in the day, a doctor would just give enough morphine to ease the pain, if it caused respiratory depression and death, it was often peaceful and no one said anything more about it.
Idiot doctors today are yammering-on about it on social media, journal articles--blah--blah--blah, bringing this issue to light and probably causing a LOT of pain & suffering, instead of shutting their traps and doing the right thing.
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You know something like 1/2 of doctors, if given the choice, would not enter the same field of study again? We presume they give a shit... my sister is a doctor and my brother in law is completing a phd/md together thing... I feel like they look at me as like a test tube or something. After spending a day with me, the brother in law told my sister that I "ask thoughtful questions" as a compliment. At least to these two, it's really like Dr House. They're the biggest brains in their head (that was pretty good, eh?) and everything is a puzzle.
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Have you guys seen You don't know jack with Al pacino about Dr. Jack Kevorkian (doctor death). It is such an awesome movie, and I don't understand how anyone can be against euthanasia to end suffering from terminal diseases. It is such bullshit the way that man was treated, and i can't believe that there are only 2? states in the US that allow it. I definitely recommend watching it if you haven't seen it or don't know his story.
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Have you guys seen You don't know jack with Al pacino about Dr. Jack Kevorkian (doctor death). It is such an awesome movie, and I don't understand how anyone can be against euthanasia to end suffering from terminal diseases. It is such bullshit the way that man was treated, and i can't believe that there are only 2? states in the US that allow it. I definitely recommend watching it if you haven't seen it or don't know his story.
I recently took a psychology class called "Death & Dying" It was very interesting and kinda led away from the normal psychology theories and studies. Anyways I had to do a paper on Dr. Kevorkian. I had not previously known anything about the man. It was so interesting reading and learning about him. Almost kind of creepy. He did some of His suicides in the back of a van with an IV device or "machine" that held types of drugs and chemicals that were released into the patient. He was later convicted of murder and sent to prison. I think he was released on special terms if I remember correctly. I will never forget in an interview he did stating that if he had the chance to do it all over again he would.
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the practice of slowly and gently overdosing terminal patients must still go on but we don't hear about it.
usually authorised by the patient's legal guardians or family.
I have no proof but euthanasia by proxy just has to happen because keeping someone alive against their wishes is painful and unnecessary and even cruel.
yep, I say it's already happening on the down low.
I want to pick the day I die unless I win the "lottery" and go out in my sleep.
anybody got the Nembutal ? where can I score it ?
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I am taking that class this semester dtb, it's an awesome class, we are going to the morgue, and a funeral home. Planning our funeral and our wills and advance directives, it definitely is very interesting. Dr. Kevorkian represented himself in the trial he lost, he had won like 10 cases before that, and it was the first case where he administered the meds himself and then did an interview on cnn and had them show the tape of it. He was given 10-25 years for second degree murder and administering narcotics but got out in 8 because he was dying from Hep C.
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I think these Right to Lifers and anti-euthanasia people are simply selfish. It's no one's business when a terminally ill person chooses to die. No one's other than the patient and their doctor.
And even then I think the majority of the choice belongs to the patient. If the doctor doesn't want to comply, their input should stop.
If I were terminally ill and knew I would be dying soon, I'd want hospice care in the comfort of my home. And if that became too much of a burden, or if I were still in too much agony, I'd want the option to take euthanasia.
When he died in 1936, George V was given a lethal dose of morphine and cocaine by his doctors to speed his death. The reasoning was that they wanted him to die before midnight.
If he died before midnight, his death notice would run in the morning edition of the London Times. If he died after midnight, the notice would run in the evening edition.
The morning edition was considered more prestigious and important than the evening, hence the euthanasia. That little tidbit was kept secret for the next fifty+ years.
I think we as a species can do a little better than only allowing euthanasia for appearances sake for a special few. Euthanasia should be a right. Dignity should be a right.
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Imagine being a doctor with the ability to end a patient's suffering, and probably not even face any legal problems from those actions, and you don't. And you just let that human being suffer.....
I think this still happens more than people think. I suspect that's how my dear old grandma went out. She was under morphine sedation 24/7, and unconscious most of the time at the end. End stage heart failure can be pretty awful and painful, like you're drowning. They installed a pacemaker about a week before she finally died, in an effort to try and save her life, but her hear was so weak at that point it didn't do anything for her.
I was thinking the other day about a prisoner with a life sentence, who has exhausted all avenues for appeal. They might want euthanasia too. Would save the taxpayers a dime for sure. Lots of dimes.
Voluntary euthanasia is one thing, but forced euthanasia is another entirely. When people start thinking about offing a terminally ill patient because their situation is "hopeless," or because (shudder) they are costing the insurance company too much money, that's where I draw the line. People's wishes to live, even if they are terminal, should always be respected above all else.
Sometimes, people have a living will that specifies "all measures to prolong life should be taken," and it tends to piss people off when they are doing a deathbed vigil for the person, but I think you treat into dangerous murder territory when you euthanize someone against their will.
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What if you're on methadone, or bupe... or shooting a gram a day? You think there's some fuckwit doctor who would be able to give someone like that a dose of opiates that keeps them nodding yet alive? Shit... with any tolerance... I imagine it's all a bit of a roll of the dice to a certain extent.... especially if combining other meds too...
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so far, we all agree.
I like like-minded folks.
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when my sister died in 2014-she died in a hospice hospital-we were careful to make sure they did not have a policy in place that has limits to the amount of pain meds they will administer. A lot of them do, I just cant imagine being told as I lay helpless and in mind bending pain as my sister was, "SORRY, you've already had TODAY'S maximum dose, and yes I realize it is ONLY 9am".
My sister was dying, yet she as afraid of becoming addicted to the pain meds.
I would not let her suffer, not on my watch.
God bless her beautiful soul.
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think of elderly parents with huge assets (like a house) being encouraged by their heirs to die ... it gets murky if it's not policed properly.
just one example ...
Yes it does get murky and that is a great example of it but as modern medicine can keep people alive longer and in some cases disregarding quality of life the idea of choosing for yourself when you should go becomes a bigger issue.
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I am personally getting more anxious about death as I get older and my biggest fear is having something tragic happen to me and then being kept alive in a coma - with whatever ails me keeping me like that.
the thought of dying is harder when you're an atheist :(
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I am glad that I am writing my advance directive for a class this year, my brother has power of attorney for me. I signed it over to him when I was in jail so he could help me get some shit done. I recently talked to him about my wishes if something were to happen and I feel like he will do right by me. I want to be cremated, and I want to be taken off life support after a second opinion saying it is unlikely that I will pull through, or if it is causing a burden on my family financial or otherwise.
I am glad to get my will and advance directive done because its too easy to die, and I don't want their to be any arguments or people feeling guilty about pulling the plug on me. My main concern is being a financial burden to my family who are keeping my alive out of guilt because they don't know what I would want, and this will hopefully clear a lot of it up and alleviate some of the guilt if something were to happen.
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I contemplated doing this for my dad as per his wishes but by chose starvation as his way of going in lieu.
When someone you love is suffering indefinitely, you soon realise that medically assisted euthanasia should be a right.
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I'm not at all surprised by the article, I'm sure this happens around the world with a much greater frequency than people might realize. I think it's pretty sad that a terminally ill, miserable person can be forced to continue enduring their personal agony against their own wishes. Sometimes I think people are more concerned with their own conscience than the patient's wishes.
I took Ethics as part of my philosophy curriculum in college, and I actually debated euthanasia and assisted suicide. I think, like a few people have said, that in certain situations the lines can become blurry. Plenty of people can get on board with passive euthanasia, ie. withholding of care, but not with active euthanasia--an actual action being taken to induce death, such as an intentional overdose. And plenty of people can accept it for terminal patients, but under what qualifications? A year left to die? Six months? What about chronic, intractable pain? There are people who live in agony every day who, while they are not dying, probably would welcome death if given the opportunity. Personally, I don't think it's my or anyone else's business to tell a person when or how they should be able to check out. I'm only 26, but I have told my parents and my lawyer about my end of life wishes. Definitely something to take care of because we never know when it may be our time, especially given this game so many of us play.