PianoManGidley wrote:
I think that assisted suicide should be something available but highly regulated--the doctor in charge of the patient should advise both the patient and/or ("or" in the case of the patient being comatose) any close family and friends on alternative options to assisted suicide, and all efforts should be made to see that assisted suicide could only be an absolute LAST resort.
I am sort of opposed to assisted suicide. The medical industry needs to focus on curing people. Making any kind of assisted suicide an absolute LAST RESORT is a good idea (good being the understatement of the century).
The only issue with the comatose is the whole "is it their wish? or the wish of someone else?" thing we saw with Terri Schiavo..
Can doctors even perform assisted suicide? Doesn't the Hippocratic Oath prevent this?
The Modern Version of the Hippocratic Oath isn't a living being, but somehow wrote:
I swear to fulfill, to the best of my ability and judgment, this covenant:
I will respect the hard-won scientific gains of those physicians in whose steps I walk, and gladly share such knowledge as is mine with those who are to follow.
I will apply, for the benefit of the sick, all measures [that] are required, avoiding those twin traps of overtreatment and therapeutic nihilism.
I will remember that there is art to medicine as well as science, and that warmth, sympathy, and understanding may outweigh the surgeon's knife or the chemist's drug.
I will not be ashamed to say "I know not," nor will I fail to call in my colleagues when the skills of another are needed for a patient's recovery.
I will respect the privacy of my patients, for their problems are not disclosed to me that the world may know. Most especially must I tread with care in matters of life and death. If it is given me to save a life, all thanks. But it may also be within my power to take a life; this awesome responsibility must be faced with great humbleness and awareness of my own frailty. Above all, I must not play at God.
I will remember that I do not treat a fever chart, a cancerous growth, but a sick human being, whose illness may affect the person's family and economic stability. My responsibility includes these related problems, if I am to care adequately for the sick.
I will prevent disease whenever I can, for prevention is preferable to cure.
I will remember that I remain a member of society, with special obligations to all my fellow human beings, those sound of mind and body as well as the infirm.
If I do not violate this oath, may I enjoy life and art, respected while I live and remembered with affection thereafter. May I always act so as to preserve the finest traditions of my calling and may I long experience the joy of healing those who seek my help.
It seems to prevent helping a patient die through direct action.
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