Terminally Ill And Nurses example essay topic

Euthanasia is a term that originated from the Greek language: eu meaning "good" and thanatos meaning "death". Generally, euthanasia implies the intentional termination of life that is initiated by a person who wishes to commit suicide. However, euthanasia has many meanings and as a result, has several terms that define and differentiate various types of euthanasia. For instance, passive euthanasia is altering a form of support thereby hastening the death of a person, i.e. removing life support or not delivering CPR. Causing the death of a person through a direct action and in response to the request of that person is considered active euthanasia. When information and / or the means are supplied by the physician to commit suicide, it is referred to as physician assisted suicide.

Jack Kevorkian, a Michigan physician, injected a controlled substance into a terminally ill patient who had requested a quick, painless exit from life. He was charged with 1st degree murder and a jury found him guilty of 2nd degree murder in 1999. Euthanasia dates back to the early 19th century and advocates use the same arguments today to justify it. They believe that people suffering from an incurable and fatal disease should be allowed by law to substitute for the slow and painful death, a quick and painless one. Advocates rationalize the latter by arguing that if it's legal to curtail the duration of pain with medication, "the same reasoning that justifies a minute's shortening of it, will justify an hour's, a day's, a week's, a month's, a year's". It is seen not only as a moral right, but also as an act of humanity.

Those who oppose euthanasia argue that legalizing it would result in abuse. One opponent claimed that physicians could use its legalization to "get rid" of an objectionable relative. As a result, the public would eventually question the trust of the medical profession. Opponents say it would also leave a patient pressured into requesting euthanasia to relieve family of their burden. They also argue that if euthanasia were legalized it would initially be for the terminally ill, then it would eventually be justified for the aged, incurable demented persons, and convicted murderers.

The American Nurses Association regards active euthanasia inconsistent with the Code for Nurses and is considered ethically unacceptable. It has been the role of a nurse to promote, preserve, and protect human life. As members of the profession, nurses are obligated to offer end of life care, which includes the promotion of comfort for pain and suffering, and foregoing life sustaining treatments. Care does not include deliberately terminating life. Where is the distinction made? Personally, it's hard for me as a nursing student to differentiate between the passive acceptance of withholding medications or treatments per the patient's request and the disfavored active form of euthanasia.

I am aware that with one form the nurse is indirectly aiding in a person's request to die and in the other form, the nurse is directly aiding in their death. Either way, the nurse was responsible for carrying out the patient's death wish. It is my belief that this topic brings about a lot of debate within the nursing profession, especially between nurses who don't deal with the terminally ill and nurses who do. It is hard to define the whole nursing profession as being opposed to euthanasia because each nurse has seen or experienced the death of someone and has been affected by it individually.

For example, I have witnessed the pain and suffering of a close friend dying of AIDS. Watching her die in such pain was very hard and her final condition a few weeks prior to her death seemed inhumane. That is something that will stay with me throughout my whole nursing career. That doesn't mean that I will go against the ethics of nursing, but it does leave me more compassionate when dealing with end of life issues. Although nurses are legally bound not to participate in euthanasia, they can provide care that might prevent the reasons euthanasia might be sought. They can continue to provide the palliative care associated with disease processes and do everything in the realm of ethical nursing and the scope of the nursing practice to make the dying transition as pain free as possible.