Physician Assisted Suicide Argumentative Essay

1. (problem – PAS): In today’s society, Physician Assisted Suicide is one of the most questionable and debatable issues. Many people feel that it is wrong for people to ask their doctor to help them end their life; while others feel it is their right to choose between the right to life and the right to death. “Suffering has always been a part of human existence.” (PAS) “Physicians have no similar duty to provide actions, such as assistance in suicide, simply because they have been requested by patients. In deciding how to respond to patients ' requests, physicians should use their judgment about the medical appropriateness of the request.” (Bernat, JL) Physician Assisted Suicide differs from withholding or discontinuing medical treatment, it consists of doctors providing a competent patient with a prescription for medication to aid in the use to end their life.

Death is inevitable, but do we ride it out until the bitter end or chose a quick and painless death? Many people are against the idea of physician-assisted suicide and others aren’t such as Faye Girish writer of the article “Should Physician-Assisted Suicide Be Legalized?” Published in 1999 in Insight on the News, she argues that the legalization of Physician-Assisted Suicide will allow those who wish to die a peaceful way to do so. Faye establishes the building of her credibility with plausible facts and statistics, great emotional appeal, and personal sources. However, throughout the article several times she attempts to use pity to guilt people into agreeing with her argument, uses celebrities as sources, and doesn’t cite some of her sources questioning her credibility and finally, her argument.

Others have argued that physician assisted suicide is not ethically permissible, because it contradicts the traditional duty of physician’s to preserve life and to do no harm. Furthermore, many argue that if physician assisted suicide is legalized, abuses would take place, because as social forces condone the practice, it will lead to “slippery slope” that forces (PAS) on the disabled, elderly, and the poor, instead of providing more complex and expensive palliative care. While these arguments continue with no end in sight, more and more of the terminally ill cry out in agony, for the right to end their own suffering.

****In this article nurses had raised some extended questions, “what is the nursing role in treating patients than physician-assisted suicide?” First, we need to define physician-assisted suicide “the provision to a patient by a medical health professional of the means of ending his or her own life” (Dilemma,2010). As we all know that the patient has the right to deny any kind of treatment at the patient’s proposal so we cannot view it as physician-assisted suicide but other than a respectful manner to the patient’s nobility and one’s own choice. Nurses encounter problems when caring for their terminally ill patient who request for a physician-assisted suicide. The Code of Ethics for Nurses, is a standard principle for nurses to abide by. When the end-of-life questions arises for nurses, “The Code of Ethics for Nurses” is to guide their practice so no

Thesis: Terminally ill patients suffering from unresolved palliative care requests physician assisted suicide in a quickened death, refusing to help patients from suffering may cause an extreme amount of unbearable pain.

The arguments for physician assisted patient suicide. Assisted suicide: The Philosopher’s’ Brief, they argue that if it is acceptable to terminate medical treatment with the intention that patient due then it is acceptable to assist in killing with the intention the intention that that patient die, at least when the patient consents and agreed on it. They argued that there is not ethical difference between killing and letting die. They also believed that people have the right to make important decisions about their own lives, and to be killed or let die could be a mean to facilitate these decisions.

When we are brought into this world that choice is made by someone else. Is it not only fair that, if the situation calls for it, we should have the choice to end our life? This brings up the big question, I know most of you thought of. Should physician assisted suicide be legalized? Some people argue that it shouldn’t and other people argue that it should. In the United States, committing suicide or attempting to commit suicide is not illegal; however, helping another person commit suicide is considered a criminal act. Physician assisted suicide occurs when a physician facilitates a patient’s death by providing the necessary means and information to enable the patient to perform the life-ending act. Physician assisted suicide occurs when a

Physician-assisted suicide is the practice of providing a competent patient with a prescription for medication for the patient to use with the primary intention of ending his or her own life. Physician assisted suicide or PAS is different from euthanasia because with euthanasia, someone else’s causes death of the person. PAS the person his or her death. Physician-assisted suicide is the voluntary termination of one's own life by administration of a lethal substance with the direct or indirect assistance of a physician. According to the Death with Dignity National Center, in the 1900s, the first publicized assisted suicide was performed by Dr. Kevorkian in 1990 and again in 1998 when he showed the world a video of this act. He was convicted of murder in 1999. Also in 1990, the U.S Supreme court ruled in the Nancy Cruzan case that the “person has the right to refuse lifesaving medical services”, and her feeding tube was removed which ended her life shortly after. The patient self-determination act was passed which allowed patients to refuse or demand medical treatment.

. The bill was shot down by more than half of the voters. Many have wondered why Michigan voters were so against this bill. In an article written by Yale Kamisar, he stated that, “the reason why the Michigan ballot went so wrong was not due to the terminally ill having the right to die, but people were questioning how it would work in a state where millions didn’t have health insurance, how it would affect family members and their dying loved one’s view on life, and one’s view on the quickness of their approaching death” (Kamisar, 1997). Another event that occurred in the Michigan that rocked voter’s views on the topic of physician-assisted suicide was the case of Dr. Jack Kevorkian. Dr. Kevorkian is a well-known figure as he helped put assisted

A policeman witnesses a man trapped underneath a burning truck. Desperate and in pain, the man asks the policeman to shoot him and save him the pain of dying a slow and insufferable death. As a result, he shoots. The policeman’s dilemma is commonly referenced in support of physician-assisted-suicide, or PAS. Euthanasia and assisted suicide are interchangeable terms which both lead to the death of an individual. Voluntary PAS is a medical professional, usually a physician, who provides medication or other procedures with the intention of ending the patient’s life. Voluntary PAS is the administration of medicine with the explicit consent from the patient. In terms of this paper, we focus on voluntary physician-assisted suicide in the

However, there is immense criticism on the morality of the process, especially because the process denies a patient the right to natural death. The critics of the assisted suicide procedure argue that such a process devalues human life and tends to promote suicide as an alternative to personal suffering. By claiming that the procedure allows terminally ill patients to initiate dignity at death is flawed because the purpose of medical profession is to ensure a dignified life. According to the physicians’ code of ethics and the Hippocratic Oath, physicians are not allowed to do harm to their patients because their role is to allow a dignified health for members of the community. Consequently, legalization of Physician Assisted suicide that requires physicians to assist the patients to die is against their medical ethics. Quill, Cassel, & Meier (2010) provide that although the patients voluntarily ask the medical practitioners to assist in the process, the practitioners have a role to advise the patients against such a procedure. Besides, such a premise is bound to raise awareness of suicide as an alternative to suffering within the public domain, which may encourage such behavior among healthy members of the community that feel that they enjoy the freedom to make such a decision. On this basis, the negative moral implication of assisted suicide makes its legalization unworthy in the

The word suicide gives many people negative feelings and is a socially taboo subject. However, suicide might be beneficial to terminally ill patients. Physician- assisted suicide has been one of the most controversial modern topics. Many wonder if it is morally correct to put a terminally ill patient out of their misery. Physicians should be able to meet the requests of their terminally ill patients. Unfortunately, a physician can be doing more harm by keeping someone alive instead of letting them die peacefully. For example, an assisted suicide can bring comfort to patients. These patients are in excruciating pain and will eventually perish. The government should not be involved in such a personal decision. A physician- assisted suicide comes with many benefits for the patient. If a person is terminally ill and wants a physician assisted suicide, then they should receive one.

The United States is a nation founded on freedoms and liberties, giving each citizen the ability to make their own life decisions. This freedom includes all aspects of one’s life, including medical care. With freedom comes responsibility, and this is true in terms of physician-assisted suicide. The ongoing struggle between those in favor and those opposed to this subject has ravaged the medical field, bringing into question what is morally and ethically right. The fact of the matter is that physician-assisted suicide is neither morally nor ethically acceptable under any circumstance. Not only is it a direct violation of a doctor’s Hippocratic Oath, but it is not constitutionally binding. Physician-assisted suicide would also lead to

Physician assisted suicide is requested by the terminally ill, typically when the pain from the illness is too much to handle and is not manageable through treatments or other medications. Assisted suicide is more of a broad term for helping someone die a good death, physician assisted suicide is where a medical doctor provides information and medication and the patient then administers the medications themselves. Euthanasia is also another term that is commonly heard, this refers to a medical doctor that voluntarily administers the lethal dose of medication to the patient when the patient requests it, due to not physically being able to do it themselves (Humphry, 2006). There pros and cons with this topic throughout the world, but is one of the biggest debated things here in the United States of America and to this day there are only five states that have legalized physician-assisted suicide (ProCon.org, 2015). The government should allow patients that are terminally ill the right to choose physician assisted suicide, why should they have to suffer when there is a way out.

“Dogs do not have many advantages over people, but one of them is extremely important: euthanasia is not forbidden by law in their case; animals have the right to a merciful death.”