LEGALIZATION OF ASSISTED SUICIDE AND EUTHANASIA.   Term Paper ID:30220 Click to get this paper

Essay Subject: Discusses implications for nursing care of Euthanasia.... More...

4 Pages / 900 Words 15 sources, 15 Citations, APA Format $16.00 Return to List of Papers

Paper Abstract: Discusses implications for nursing care of Euthanasia. Argues that legalizatioin of end-of-life options makes sense. Debate over issue. Varied definitions of passive euthanasia & assisted suicide. Issue of patient autonomy. Responsibilities of nurses to safeguard patients; their supportive role in health care. Following the orders of physicians. ANA code. Paper Introduction: This research examines whether assisted suicide and euthanasia should be legalized and the implications for nursing care. The position taken herein is that legalization makes sense. However, that position should not be confused with an endorsement of assisted suicide and euthanasia. That is, the fact of legalization of end-of-life options for patients and caregivers does not carry with it a mandate for acting them out. In recent years, the issue of euthanasia has come up before the legislatures of many states. But debate has been problematic for a variety of reasons. To begin with, there are problems connected with discussing euthanasia from a philosophical standpoint alone. That is because philosophy overlaps into law, public policy, medical practice, and medical administration. Another problem is that there is no single definition of eutha Text of the Paper: The entire text of the paper is shown below. However, the text is somewhat scrambled. We want to give you as much information as we possibly can about our papers and essays, but we cannot give them away for free. In the text below you will find that while disordered, many of the phrases are essentially intact. From this text you will be able to get a solid sense of the writing style, the concepts addressed, and the sources used in the research paper. The Patients'Self-Determination Act of 199 specifically guarantees patients the rightto refuse medical treatment and requires hospitals receiving federalMedicare and Medicaid funding to inform patients of their right to refusemedical treatment. The Washington Post, A3. Chater, S. What is best about nursing is that nurses areuniquely suited to providing time-sensitive and accurate information andpractical assistance to patients, families, and health-care colleaguesregarding the current facts of a case, and in a compassionate way(Czerwiec, 1996). J. 93-4). Institutional realities intrude. Nurses obliged to follow physicians'orders and advance directives understand know that not all physicians withwhom they "collaborate" have identical ideas about palliative care. Kansas City, Mo.: American Nurses' Association.Retrieved from the World Wide Web 2 September 2 1, athttp://www.sc.edu/nursing/hbkcode.htm. 91). That is becausephilosophy overlaps into law, public policy, medical practice, and medicaladministration. (2 , July). Some form ofassisted suicide was considered a commonplace of American health care bythe mid-199 s (Cotton, 1995). (1994, Feb.). Euthanasiais what the American Medical Association's Council on Ethical and Judicialdescribes as a doctor's administering to a patient some means of death,such as "death-causing drug or other agent" (Glasson, 1994, p. Moral foundation ofnursing. (2 1). To begin with, there are problems connected with discussingeuthanasia from a philosophical standpoint alone. It authorizes withholding life-support treatments whendisadvantages of living outweigh the advantages. S. (1996, May). McClung, J.A. Conceptual framework for curriculumdevelopment. 2). The fact that nurses have to function in a mainly supportingrole requires more, not less, professionalism on their part. (1975, July). Tammelleo, A.D. The New England Journalof Medicine, 323, 27 -2. Advances in Nursing Science, 86, 63-73. Weiser, B. J. What trends like these reflect is a movement toward patient autonomythat occurred in the last decades of the 2 th century. "Death & dying: Bedside vigils." Nursing, 3 ,26. It was estimated in the early199 s that some 7 % of deaths in all modern hospitals were the result ofconscious decisions to stop medical treatment (Walters, 1992). (1995, Feb. 2 doctors take controversial stand on feedingthose near death. References American Nurses Association Code for Nurses with interpretivestatements. 161: Aid in dyingis human, humane. Further, end-of-life law has not been unambiguous. But matters are not so simple today because of overlap ofphilosophy, morality, law, and the like in end-of-life contexts. (1994, April). Nonnegotiable nature of the ANA Code for Nurses with interpretivestatements. This research examines whether assisted suicide and euthanasia shouldbe legalized and the implications for nursing care. But such declarations do not capture the fact that nurses have nothistorically been full partners in the delivery of health care, have notbeen empowered to safeguard clients in their care even though they havebeen required to do so. Thatis, the fact of legalization of end-of-life options for patients andcaregivers does not carry with it a mandate for acting them out. RN, 63, 75-81. Other nurses, says Ufema, consider it wasteful and futile totreat those who rescind DNR orders. Ufema, J. & Kamer, R.S. . . The wordeuthanasia comes from Greek, first eu, meaning "good," then thanatos,meaning "death." In general, this has resulted in explaining euthanasia asmercy killing. M., & Hammes, B. But another trendthat increased during that same period was the emergence of the whole fieldof bioethics, in which definitive answers to difficult questions are hardto identify. Problems arise for nurses who ignore aDNR order because of a physician's order, or who expose themselves toprosecution if they ignore a DNR rescission. 161) cite thefine line between "assisted suicide, a morally objectionable means orintent (killing) [and] the treatment used to achieve a morally permissibleend (pain relief)." As a practical matter, nurses have more responsibility than authority,and one way of resolving end-of-life obligations on nurses would be eitherto give them more authority or lessen their responsibility for patientwelfare and outcomes. Perspective on prop. If, as Chater, for one (1975), advocates, nurses'training is best if it occurs with reference to place and client as well asto technical skill, so execution of nursing expertise that is client-centered rather than instituion- or medical-team-centered would seem to bedesirable. When a loved one is dying: families talk aboutnursing care. Report of the council on ethical andjudicial affairs of the American Medical Association. Canadian Medical Association Journal, 159, 159-62. 7 ). (199 , July 26). Ethics and pain management:Respecting patient wishes. American Journal of Nursing, 96, 32-6. But debate has been problematic for a varietyof reasons. (1994, Summer). RN, 57, 59-62. (1992, October 18). Has the PSDA made a difference? Glasson, J. They must also answer to thehospital administrative apparatus. Protecting patients' end-of-lifechoices. careers on the line, even if they are acting on behalf of the patientand have strong justification for doing so" (Yarling and McElmurry, 1986,p. (1997). However, that position should notbe confused with an endorsement of assisted suicide and euthanasia. And it must be noted that theANA considers its code nonnegotiable (Nonnegotiable, 2 1). Nursing World. Palliative treatment refers, according to the AMA, to a "doubleeffect," i.e., giving such high drug dosages for pain relief that they alsoend the patient's life (Glasson, 1994, pp. Issues In Law &Medicine, 1 , 91-97. (2 , August). R., & McElmurry, B. But as of the mid-199 s, some patients were unaware oftheir options in this area, owing to hospital or doctor noncompliance and areluctance of the health-care field to embrace the idea of facilitating end-of-life actions (Greve, 1994; Tammelleo, 2 ). Retrieved from the World Wide Web 2 September 2 1, athttp://www.nursingworld.org/readroom/position/ethics/etcode.htm Singer, P. Yarling, R. But the trends have not been all in onedirection. Ufema(2 ), who is a nurse, cites a terminally ill woman with a DNR order inplace who during a seizure rescinded the order and begged to bereintubated. Cain and Hammes (1994, p. &, MacDonald, N. 159) point outthat physicians who are trained to systematically intervene in acuteillnesses or injuries "do not have an analogous conceptual framework forapproaching end-of-life care." The line between palliative treatment andphysician-assisted suicide would seem to be particularly muddled. The position takenherein is that legalization makes sense. (1983, Nov. The custom and practice of withholding food from comatose terminalpatients appears to have been in place for nearly 2 years (Weiser, 1983).In 1987, when New York formally regulated Do-Not-Resuscitate (DNR) ordersby doctors, it turned out that advance-consent DNR orders had been de factoin place for years (McClung & Kamer, 199 ). Ironically,more professionalism can breed increasingly unrealistic expectations ofthem. Bioethics for clinicians: Qualityend-of-life care. Medicine's position is both pivotal andprecarious in assisted-suicide debate. Another problem is that there is no single definition ofeuthanasia on which medical practitioners and policy makers agree. American Journal of Nursing, 23, 428-33. That means end-of-lifeissues are in suspension, remain unresolved, or subject to the varyingdemands of health-care-team leaders. Cain, J. Journal of Pain and Symptom Management, 9, 16 -5. Cotton, P. 1). A. AMA has a separatedefinition for assisted suicide, apparently because of the high profile ofsuch figures as Dr. Jack Kevorkian, which means that a doctor gives apatient either means or knowledge to commit suicide but does not performthe act. (1986, January). Legislating ethics:implications of New York's Do-Not-Resuscitate law. JAMA, The Journal of the AmericanMedical Association, 273, 363. Currently the ANA Code does not provide nurses with an advocacy optionwith respect to end-of-life issues; the supporting role of nurses appearsto be the only concept that the code endorses. (1998). Legalizing assisted suicide might not give nurses any moreauthority in an institutional setting, but recourse to law might relievethem of some of the responsibility that is unnecessarily, unrealistically,and burdensomely imposed on them. Responsibility, however, is embedded in the ANA Codefor Nurses, which provides, in part, that nurses act "to safeguard theclient and the public when health care and safety are affected by theincompetent, unethical, or illegal practice of any person," and that they"assume responsibility and accountability for individual nursing judgmentsand actions." The ANA Code declares that nurses are to "collaborate" withthe other health-care providers (ANA, 1997). Greve, P.J.D. In recent years, the issue of euthanasia has come up before thelegislatures of many states. Walters, J.W. This is relevant to nursing because nurses are the caregivers on theline who are positioned to execute or implement the health-care directivesof others, whether physicians or patients. For all of these reasons, legalizingassisted suicide in an unambiguous way would seem to have the benefit oflending protection to nurses in a context muddled by different prioritiesof the law, morality, and philosophical differences within the health-carecommunity. For example, Singer and MacDonald (1998, p. Meanwhile, nurses who openly challenge established authoritystructures or powerful physicians in a hospital bureaucracy most often put. Los Angeles Times, Home Edition, M5. Firstthere is passive euthanasia, which is governed by the "patient's proxy,"such as a living will, durable power of attorney, or other advancedirective. Czerwiec, M. If this paper is not what you are looking for, you can search again: Search for: or Click here to request an essay written just for you.