Man gets the "go-ahead" to kill his wife - Page 2

[Greaseball]

Maybe someone should do a study on the murder of helpless hospital patients by such a method and how they felt about it.

I have talked with people who attempted suicide this way and they could not last more than a day. They say they will most definitely do something different next time.

A boy I went to school with was on a feeding tube. He could function normally in most ways; he just could not eat by mouth. It connected into his stomach and he would pour the solution in. It probably cost the taxpayers a lot of money but I'm glad he is still alive.

[kama'aina mama]

This question of how painful dehydration is or isn't is very interesting to me. It was almost certainly my mothers cause of death. She was exhibiting signs of serious discomfort/ pain to the degree that we had a hospice nurse about to give her IV morphine when she died. Her pain may well have come from a variety of other sources, however.

[Marlena]

Oh, for heaven's sakes.

http://www.nhpco.org/i4a/pages/index...&openpage=3840

The study, “Nurses’ Experiences with Hospice Patients Who Refuse Food and Fluids to Hasten Death,” surveyed hospice nurses in Oregon regarding patients who made the choice to stop eating and drinking in order to hasten death. In 2001, questionnaires were mailed to nurses employed by all 50 Medicare-certified home hospice programs in the state, as well as two hospices in neighboring states that provide service for patients in Oregon. A total of 429 nurses received the questionnaire. Seventy-two percent of the nurses surveyed responded; among those nurses, 33 percent (102 respondents) reported that in the previous four years they had cared for a patient who elected to forgo food and fluids with the intention of hastening death.

Nurses reported that these patients “chose to stop eating and drinking because they were ready to die, saw continued existence as pointless, and considered their quality of life poor.” Survey results indicate that 85 percent of these patients died within 15 days after stopping food and fluids. The quality of death among these patients, as rated by the responding nurses, was eight on a scale of zero (a very bad death) to nine (a very good death.)

[kama'aina mama]

I appreciate that Marlena. Thanks.

[Greaseball]

So, the nurses get to decide and report who is having a pleasant death experience and who is not? Why not ask the patients to keep a journal as they die? Studies are meaningless without input from the studied population.

There is a big difference between suicide and murder - in one area you have choices and in one you do not!

There has to be a reason why dehydration and starvation are not among the top ten suicide methods in any population. Could it be because most people would not enjoy it?

[JessicaS]

I think the nurses would be a better judge than a Dr who spend much less time with individual patients.

But if they kept a journal it would be up to the families on whether or not they shared it. Most wouldn't.

[Marlena]

Originally posted by Greaseball
So, the nurses get to decide and report who is having a pleasant death experience and who is not? Why not ask the patients to keep a journal as they die? Studies are meaningless without input from the studied population.

I suspect that many of these patients were not in a state to keep a journal. The median age, if I remember correctly, was 80. They may have had impediments to speech, and likely also had arthritis or other issues that would curtail them from holding a writing implement.

There is a big difference between suicide and murder - in one area you have choices and in one you do not!

I'm confused - are you implying that the folks in this study were murdered? They weren't. They chose to die this way. They weren't sprightly young suicidal folks who could slash their arms or pull a trigger or something. Or are you referring back to the OP? If so, then I agree - the situation in the OP would indeed be murder, unless the woman was sufficiently alert and with it to indicate her choice herself (whether it were yea or nay).

There has to be a reason why dehydration and starvation are not among the top ten suicide methods in any population. Could it be because most people would not enjoy it?

I suspect it's likely because there are much quicker ways to make one's exit, and that most suicidal folks are not inclined to wait the 2+ weeks it takes to die of dehydration and starvation.