Assisted Suicide: History, Laws and Personal Perspectives

What states have law allowing assisted suicide?

How will you find your own belief and opinion about assisted suicide?

What is the history of assisted suicide?

What are the pros and cons of assisted suicide?

History

Advocacy for physician assistance in dying when faced with a terminal illness has a long history, and recently we've seen some great strides forward:

Oregon: In 1994 voters passed this law, and after a series of challenges went into effect in 1997. Legal challenges continued even after Oregon's law went into effect culminating in the 2006 US Supreme Court decision in 2006's Gonzales vs. Oregon.

Washington: In 2008, Washington voters passed their Death with Dignity Act, and effect in 2009.

Montana: In December 2009, Montana's Supreme

Court ruled nothing in the state law prohibited a physician from honoring a terminally ill, mentally competent patient's request by prescribing medication to hasten the patient's death. In 2013, a bill was introduced to the Montana legislature regarding Death with Dignity. Modeled on the existing Death with Dignity laws, it would've codified the Supreme Court ruling and outlined the circumstances when the physician could prescribe the medication. The bill was tabled by the Senate Judiciary Committee, a procedural move to prevent the bill from moving forward. While a standard of care for physician assisted death still needs to be developed, the Senate committee listened to the will of the people and honored individuals' decisions regarding how to live the rest of his or her life when faced with a terminal illness.
Vermont: with Governor Peter Shumlin's signature on May 20, 2013, Vermont became the third state to enact a Death with Dignity law—the first in New England and the first to be passed through legislation. The law went into effect immediately. (Death with Dignity National Center, 2014)
Current Research, Information and Statistics
Medical experts in the United States remain divided in their opinion of whether physician-assisted suicide should be legal, a new poll suggests, indicating that the way in which patients die and the role of palliative care will remain issues of much debate.
In the poll conducted by the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) among the journal's readers, who are primarily health-care providers, people from 74 countries cast 2,356 votes, including 1,712 votes from U.S. readers.
Overall, about 65 percent of votes were against the idea of permitting physician-assisted suicide.

The rate among U.S. voters was similar, with about 67 percent voting against physician-assisted suicide. (Bahar Gholipour, 2013)

The PEW research group did a large study that got statistic data to support or refute assisted suicide. There were many studies and polls performed to look at the different views on assisted suicide.

http://www.pewforum.org/2013/11/21/views-on-end-of-life-medical-treatments/

Pros and Cons

Autonomy (independence and the right of self-determination) is certainly valued in modern society and patients do, and should, have the right to accept or reject medical treatment. However, those who favor assisted suicide claim that autonomy extends to the right of a patient to decide when, where, how and why to die

Elimination of suffering: The second pillar of assisted-suicide advocacy is elimination of suffering. During each and every attempt to permit euthanasia and assisted suicide, its advocates stress that ending suffering justifies legalization of the practices. (Marker, 2013)

There are Cons but most of the Cons found relate back to religion and sin vs. non sin, and heaven vs. hell.

But just like everything else, everyone has their own opinion and this is one subject where there will be several

opinions.
Varying points of view
Although public opinion in the US on physician-assisted suicide is evenly divided, about half of states have either defeated bills to legalize assisted suicide or have passed laws explicitly banning it and only two states have legalized it. "A Disability Perspective on the Issue of Physician-Assisted Suicide," a special issue of Disability and Health Journal, examines the issues related to assisted suicide and disability, the legal considerations and the Oregon and Washington experiences.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/12/091223074701.htm

"For people to argue against this choice for sick people really seems evil to me. They are try to mix it up with suicide and that's really unfair, because there's not a single part of me that wants to die. But I am dying.“ -Brittany Maynard, 2014
There are committees who argue the ethics of such decisions
Arguments supporting
Suffering; The argument from suffering asserts that it is cruel to force a dying patient whose pain cannot be controlled with medication to continue living. It is undeniable that many terminally ill patients die in terrible pain.
Autonomy Although suffering is a prominent justification given for legalizing PAS, it is not only or even primarily physical pain that leads patients to request it. According to the Fifth Annual Report on Oregon’s Death with Dignity Act: “... patient requests for lethal medications stemmed from multiple concerns related to autonomy and control at the end of life. The three most commonly mentioned end-of-life concerns during 2002 were: loss of autonomy, a decreasing ability to participate in activities that made life enjoyable, and losing control of bodily functions.”
Arguments against
Religious arguments; Historically laws against suicide and mercy killing have developed from religious doctrine, for example, the claim that only God has the right to determine when a person will die, or that committing suicide is a blasphemous rejection of God’s gift of life.

Whatever the force of such arguments for believers, these arguments do not justify restricting the liberty of individuals in a secular society.

Physicians as healers; Many physicians regard PAS as violating a fundamental tenet of medicine: to heal and not to harm. Dr Kenneth Stevens, chairman of the department of radiation oncology at the Oregon Health and Science University in Portland, and an opponent of the Oregon law, says, “I went into medicine to help people. I didn’t go into medicine to give people a prescription for them to die.” (Steinbock, 2005)

Strategies to deal with the issue

There is no real way with dealing with the issue. It is what it is. Rather you agree with it or not it exists and will continue to

exist.
The public will continue to have their own opinion without looking at it from the patients point of view and the doctors view.
There are other subjects such as abortion that has so many other view points that many doesn’t see. If they was to work in the health care field or be directly related in this patients care their view may change.
There is no strategy directly related to this beside putting the criticism to the side and your personal beliefs to the test.
What it means to me
Nurses in these areas have to work under those doctors that prescribe those medications. We as nurses need to find what WE, ourselves believe about the issue before we agree to be a part of that society. Of course we aren’t the ones writing the prescription but we are the ones that work under the doctors and we are just involved in the patients care. And sometimes nurses are the ones to dispense the drugs to those patients.
This subject is almost as close to the subject of abortion. The nurses should find their place and decide what they believe from there.
Many nurses think differently than others, but most nurses look at a patients life with quality VS quantity in this type of situation.
Conclusion
This is a subject that is a very hot topic at this time. There are many pros and cons that most humans will not look at in the patients point of view.
This is a personal opinion of belief
Assisted suicide in our opinion is personal option in life. No one walks a day in that patient’s life to suffer the pain and hurt that they go through on a daily basis and until then I believe no one should judge this law until they personally have to deal with something like this