Custom essays on Physicians Assisted Suicide

The unbearable pain that can not drown and that pushes everything else out of life, for many people is the most awful nightmare that they can imagine. Someone is afraid that when he wants just to die quietly, relatives and doctors will begin to impose him the endless and painful procedures, desperately trying to prolong his life. Other are afraid of the prospect to remain bedridden for many months and years, while being unable to somehow respond to the presence of relatives and doctors.
All these fears are forcing people to think about the legality of physician-assisted suicide (PAS). At first sight, it seems that it is motivated by compassion for the patient and respect for his rights. However, if we give people assistance in committing suicide, it is likely to lead to a decrease in the overall respect for human life; so is unlikely to be the best way to help a specific person.
Christians believe that human beings are created “in God’s image”, and therefore their life has such a high value. That is why God forbids people to kill another person deliberately.
On this issue, there are different opinions, but some Christians say that in certain exceptional circumstances, we are allowed to deprive a person of life, for example, in cases of particularly serious crimes, or during a “fair war”. There are also similar bans in the traditions of Judaism and Islam (Hastings. 2004).
In discussion of physician-assisted suicide or euthanasia, we need to understand the meaning of these two phenomena. They have very similar goals, but PAS and euthanasia differ in whether or not the doctor takes part in the action that finally ends life.
In Physician-assisted suicide: the doctor provides the necessary means and the patient performs the act himself. In Euthanasia: the physician performs the intervention (Behuniak. 2003).
The definitions of euthanasia and physician assisted suicide underscore the moral, ethical and legal concept of “intent”. But there is a huge difference between the medical procedure aimed at achieving a fatal outcome (for example: lethal injection), and the termination of ineffective or inappropriate treatment. In the first case we are dealing with murder in the second – with good medical practice. Doctors and lawyers have always made a distinction between them (Gorsuch, 2006).
A call for compassion. One of the main arguments in favor of the PAS is the compassion – a sense of pain and pity felt while watching someone’s misfortune or suffering.
However, the argument based on compassion is misplaced, because the best way to show compassion to a man is to take care of him. Currently, hospice movement together with the advanced medical technologies are able to adequate alleviate the pain and suffering of almost all patients with the exception of only the most extreme cases. The experience shows that as soon as the pain recedes, many patients cease to seek death.
The best way to treat a dying person with dignity and respect is to provide him with necessary care and to make his life as comfortable as possible and fuller. It is a much stronger and more positive action than hopelessly to wave at the man with his hand and speed up his death. The natural death of a person has more dignity (Kopelman. 2001).
The right to personal autonomy. Some people claim their right for PAS (and euthanasia), referring to the right for personal autonomy. However, the right to personal autonomy is not so easy to define.
In recent years, medicine, luckily, moved away from a paternalistic attitude to the patient and authoritarian assertions that “doctor knows better what and how to do”. But as John Donne said: “There is no person lonely as the island, so every man is a part of the continent” (Foley. (2002). The act of a man committing suicide, have an enormous impact on all those affected by the tragedy. Asserting his right to autonomy, a person who commits suicide denies the right of those who remain to live.
In addition, an approval of the free right to personal autonomy in terms of PAS can significantly reduce the respect of society to the weak and defenseless people.
There is nothing wrong in autonomy as long as it reflects the individuality of each person. But the responsible use of personal autonomy, we must keep in balance our rights (what we are allowed), responsibilities (what we should do) and constraints (what we can not do). It turns out that autonomy does not entitle a person to do what he pleases (Quill. 2004).
Moreover, the depression, confusion, painful physical symptoms, feeling “a burden”, the conscious and unconscious pressures from family, friends, medical personnel or the public – all these can deprive a person of genuine autonomy. Probably, in most cases, when a patient asks for PAS, he is affected by one of these factors. The fact is that when a patient suffers from pain, and requests to expedite his death, we have every reason to believe that his request is a result of severe pain, and not the result of free choice (Jochemsen. 1999). Based on a recent study, 57% of physicians practicing today have received a request for PAS in some form or another.
Finally, in contrast to suicide, PAS does not occur in isolation. By definition, the PAS requires intervention by a doctor, so that the patient’s decision infringes on personal autonomy of the doctor.