From: "Robert G Lewis" 


"Gary Britt"  wrote in message
news:43d8ef0b$1{at}w3.nls.net...
>
> "Dyana"  wrote in message
> news:43d7ccc7{at}w3.nls.net...
>> Phil Payne wrote:
>>
>> My husband was also lucid until the last moment of his life. He was
>> laughing, telling me he was
>> excited about watching Bush being grilled at the UN.  and then he
>> just fell asleep...
>>
>
> Did your husband know he was about to be put to sleep?  The paragraph
> above
> makes it sound like he didn't?
>
> There are significant problems with doctors being in the death business.
> Not the least of which is when its legal to kill patients upon their
> request
> that doctors and others begin killing people AGAINST their wishes.  The
> Netherlands, where killing patient's by doctors is legal, has done a study
> of their system and found over 1,000 patients KILLED WITHOUT THEIR
> CONSENT.
>
> There are other problems with doctors being in the death business.  HMO's
> and other managed care health insurance programs pressure doctors and
> hospitals through rules and bonus systems to kill/allow patients to die
> even
> when that may not be the patient's or family's wishes.  The doctors and
> nurses and hospital care liaisons begin pressuring family members when
> they
> are at highly emotional states to sign non-resuscitation orders and other
> releases that allow the patients to die/be killed much more quickly.  This
> process which is bad enough at the time of last illness would become much
> worse where doctors are allowed to legally kill patients.
>
> I understand the awful circumstances which can make some patients and some
> family members of dying patients wish for a more quick end to what appears
> to be the inevitable.  Should that ever become legal, doctors performing
> patient care should NOT be those illegally empowered to kill patients, any
> all possible, direct and indirect, profit motives from the patient's death
> (whether by cost reductions in treatment and care expenses or through the
> selling of patient organs and/or services related thereto (e.g. profit
> from
> their transplant, etc.) must be completely eliminated beyond any question.
> Further, the killing of these patients should NOT be legal in the care
> facilities.  It should take place only in a death facility that the
> patient
> is transferred to.  Without these kinds of safeguards those wonderful
> compassionate doctors you write about will start killing patients against
> their will.  Then they and their hospitals breakup the champagne and
> celebrate the positive effects on their bonuses from the insurance/managed
> care industry.
>
> Gary
>
>

Nice to see you can still rant 

You do bring up some very good points about a potential conflicts of
interest though. I would say that the so call 'death facilities should not
be owned, operated by or have any significant ownership by ( or financial
connections to) the heath care providers. Personally if I  involved in the
decision I would prefer to have a trusted family doctor involved. Key word
is trusted .

Watching the staff in Cardiac ICU and a couple of months later Trauma ICU I
doubt that ANY of them would ever celebrate the death of a patient ( at
least in the local/regional hospital here).  The only time we were asked
about what measures they should take was by the RN in a low key manner
after getting mother stabilized . Those further up the food chain and the
bean counters  well ............

Bob Lewis

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