Terri Schiavo Case Summary

In 1983 Elizabeth Bouvia, who was a 26-year-old quadriplegic who was affected by cerebral palsy, entered a hospital in Riverside, California wishing to starve herself to death. Elizabeth Bouvia suffered from cerebral palsy and severe arthritis causing her to be in chronic pain and close to being completely paralyzed. Bouvia was only able to make movement in some fingers on her right hand and make a few facial movements. Elizabeth Bouvia was unable to sit up and could only lay flat causing her to be confined to her bed, and further causing her to depend on others for even the simplest of tasks. Bouvia relied on others to feed her, bathe her, and help her defecate. Bouvia had no one in her life able to care for her around the clock like she needed, so out of options Bouvia entered Riverside General Hospital.

When a patient is unable to make decisions for himself or herself, their caregivers and those who know them are appointed to make the decisions based on what the patient would have wanted. This is called surrogate decision making. According to the article Terri Schiavo and End-of-Life Decisions “when surrogate decision makers and caregivers cannot agree upon what that choice would have been, they may turn to the courts to determine either what the now-incapacitated patient would have chosen or who is best suited to choose as the patient would have” (Mathes, 2005)

According to Mirror News, In October of 2014 a women named Charlotte Fitzmaurice Wise was watching her daughter Nancy Fitzmaurice suffer from pain. She was born with Hydrocephalus and septicaemia which made it impossible for her to walk, talk, eat or drink. She required around the clock care and was fed through tubes. As time went on her health worsened and she would scream in pain even though she was injected with morphine. Wise believed that her daughter was in excruciating pain and deserved to be at peace. Wise submitted an application to end her daughter’s misery, and soon her application would be approved. She was able to relieve her daughter from pain, and made it legal in the United Kingdom for a parent to end their critically ill child’s life if they are disable and can’t speak for themselves.

Brittany Maynard was one of the people to use the Death with Dignity Act in Organ and once said,“To have control of my own mind…to go with dignity is less terrifying. When I look at both options I have to die, I feel this is far more humane” (Sandeen, 2014). No matter what, we will all eventually die, but we should have the right to die as humanely as possible. The Death with Dignity Act is an end-of-life choice possibility for terminally ill patients to be given the freedom to decide for themselves what it means to die with dignity. This act allows them to die with dignity by providing them with lethal medications prescribed by a physician (The Oregon Department of Human Services, 2006). The Death with Dignity Act started to allow people with six months or less to live, the right to die in a manner and at the time of their own choosing. Also, even though modern medicine has benefited humanity greatly, it cannot completely resolve the suffering and distress that comes with the dying process, so Death with Dignity can provide a painless end-of-life choice for suffering individuals (Humphry, 2009). Although Death with Dignity is a controversial topic I feel it can be very beneficial especially since people go through a long process just to try to get the medication and the ones that get it really need it. I chose this topic because death always has been interesting to me and I one day hope to have a career

Compare the situations surrounding Diane and Debbie in terms of the physicians’ actions and morality surrounding those actions leading to their deaths. How are the cases similar? How are they different? What was the situation surrounding Terri Schiavo? How does her situation compare to the Diane and Debbie cases? What are the major ethical issues involved in each of these three cases? How are their cases similar? What are the ethically relevant, salient differences between them? What do you personally take away as the “moral of the story” for these three cases?

Hampson, L. A., & Emanuel, E. J. (2005). The prognosis for changes in end-of-life care after the schiavo case. Health Affairs, 24(4), 972-5.

This emotionally charged case has strained the limits of medical, legal and moral reasoning. The facts of the case raise crucial questions concerning human life, its purpose, ends

In the year of 1990 on February 25, a presumably healthy young women by the name of Theresa Marie Schiavo better known as Terri suffered a massive heart attack in her Florida home which left her with serve brain damage. At the age of 26 she found herself unable to speak, or move, and unfortunately without a living will in place. How can she have told them what she really wanted if unable to talk in a vegetative state? Terri, although able to breathe on her own, found herself unable to eat or use the bathroom without the aid of a machine or person she was literally a prisoner in her own body. By law her husband Michael Schiavo was in charge of making treatment decisions for her , and after two years of therapy he wanted to disconnect the feeding tubes that helped keep her alive.

CM Gilmore contacted Terri Mohn who, is a relative of Crystal Mohn. Terri provide the following:

Danny Bond was a young man that was born with an excruciating bowel disease. As he body grew, so did the pain that he went through. There was nothing that doctors could do to save him. He wanted to die but everyone refused to help him, so he attempted to kill himself numerous times. Each time his mother intervene, saving him. Soon after his 21st birthday, his health plummeted and the pain became unbearable. Again, he spoke about no longer wanting to live and again no one listened so he starved himself to death, because it was considered the only legal way for him to kill himself. If a person is undergoing an excruciating incurable disease he should be able to have a say as to whether or not he lives or dies. And if he chooses to die, starvation

Case Study 2 Analysis of “The Schiavos” and “Fetal Testing for Down Syndrome” Terri Schiavo was a young woman who was in a persistent vegetative state (PSV) for nearly 13 years. Her husband fought to have her feeding tube removed to allow her to die naturally, but her family contested his fight, claiming that Terri was responsive, healthy and interactive. Although her autopsy results confirmed what her husband has been arguing, that she was blind, unable to communicate, or interact and without purposeful interaction, her family continued to contest that she was responsive, (Schiavo Autopsy). Terri’s case involved the application of passive, involuntary euthanasia by allowing her natural death after the cessation of her tube feedings. Evaluation

When I was a sophomore, my health class had a debate about a news article that had been published a few months prior on the 12News website. The story was about a girl named Jerika who was born with Spinal Muscular Atrophy Type Two, and after thirteen years of life, decided to go on Hospice and be taken off her ventilator. When I had first started to read the article, I thought about how this could be any different from suicide with the help of doctors, and I questioned how anyone could think it was morally or ethically right. I thought about how she was only thirteen and she could not possibly be able to make this kind of decision by herself. I felt even more upset when I read about how her mother had just accepted Jerika’s decision so easily

If I had a 1% chance of not coming out of a coma or persistent vegetative state I would want the physicians to continue to treat me and keep me on a respirator for a limited amount of time. I believe that God has the final say if you will come out of the coma. However, if after being treated for a sufficient amount of time has passed, I would want the physicians to stop the usage of a respirator. At that point if I’m supposed to live or die, God will be the one to decide if I live or die. Now that being said, if all else has failed I would not want to live for example, as the way Terri Schiavo was being kept alive.

After reading more the Oregon Model in our text I’m still on the fence. Maybe my reasons are selfish but I do not all the way agree with the legalization of this. Also coming from a strong religious background it’s very hard to believe in this. For instance my grandmother is in a rehab center due to having stroke. It’s been over a year now and she has had many ups and downs through the past year. Many times she has said she want it to over and she wanted to go to heaven. When she first started the depressive state it lasted a few months, then it became less frequent. I could image agreeing or her agreeing to take her life. I know Terri Schiavo case was much more serve but I’m sure her family had to go back and forth in their heads about that

We should not fight death; after all, it will come sooner or later. In 2014, a woman by the name of Marlise Munoz collapsed in her home due to a blood clot in her lungs. She was declared brain-dead, but rather than heed the family’s wishes to take Munoz off of life support, the hospital decided to keep her on it, due to her being pregnant. This sparked much dispute throughout the country. Many people believed the hospital was doing the right thing, but others decided it was not the hospital’s right to do this to the family. We in the twenty-first century need to decide that life sustainment is wrong, because it is not keeping someone alive, it is just extending their death. People on life support are not living, just like Valdemar in Poe’s story.