Why is it anyone's business but my own over when or how I should die. As long as I am of sound mind it will be a time of my own choosing. All I need is some nembutal. I hasten to add that I am a long way from going just yet, but if I suffer a debilitating incurable disease, I shall certainly take the steps to end my life. I do not believe any myth about life after death and it is usually the devoutly religious who want to prolong suffering by a refusal to pass any law by which a person may make a choice and to get medical help to undertake this step.

Will no one rid me of these meddlesome priests ?

I meantioned a friend the other week here on this forum, who I knew back in 2000-01 who was a casual agency nurse. She was a fairly heavy drinker, and although it's an anecdote, late one night when she was reasonable sloshed and nothing much on the television, she told me how it was fairly normal practice when she was posted back at the same hospital for a while, and was aware of the individual 'subjects', and left alone with suffering patients on life support, just to turn off the oxygen for five minutes and wait, before returning the supply back to the original setting and leaving.

Bending the rules for her, but for the patient, bent to breaking point.

I guess it helps free up ICU beds before public holiday seasons.

Seano that is an awful story! That nurse sounds like he/she should be locked up for attempted murder or torture.

Foxy's poor relative <"...was in a semivegetating state, had lost their functional and mental independence - and yet was being given fluids and other vigorous support to preserve their life..."

I am sorry for what you and your family have been through Foxy, and yes I have heard of cases like this.
However, as a general rule, if a person is no longer able to give consent themselves, then the next of kin can speak for them.
Usually, if the situation is dire and there is no hope for recovery, then the next of kin can ask for no active treatment for the patient.

This is not the same as euthanasia, but is just allowing nature to take it's course.
What often happens though is that some family members hold onto false hope and refuse to give up- asking medical staff to continue treatment and keep the patient alive. There are often arguments among family members about this subject.

Living wills are the only answer to these dilemmas.

"Seano that is an awful story! That nurse sounds like he/she should be locked up for attempted murder or torture."

Sorry Suze. I'm at the stage with my own illness now where I tend to speak the truth or stay stum, but please bear in mind that it was only two or three minutes of torture because five minutes without oxygen is certain death + 2 minutes to be sure, and not as painful an ending as my friend saw in the prolonged life of the victim.

As was said on the previous page, doctors (and nurses) do have consciences however well-disguised at times, but that night when she confessed this to me did come as rather a shock that I can't forget to this day, and the friendship was over not long afterwards. The high-paying, low effort casual work that she had was very important to her in keeping some sort of income, and I could see that she brought the subject up that night because she was uncertain about the righteousness of one sort of torture; life against the other, death.

At least she had the capacity to think of the consequences to these victims, but I would never provide her personal details, nor the particular hospital where she had been posted at the time.

Still, if I was one of those patients under her palliative care, I don't know whether I would have wanted her to do what she did or not. It is too late when one cannot speak or write on a piece of paper either of two simple words: yes or no.

Dear Suze,

In our family's case there were no family
arguments. We simply wanted nature to
take its course, as you menioned in your
post. The family member had become anorexic
(they were not able to eat), and fluctuated
between fever, difficulty in breathing,
and pain. Doctors insisted that they could
do nothing. Yet they continued giving
intravenous antibiotics, fluids and other
support.

We had to deal with the agony of the deterioration,
and the suffering.

I realize that many people feel that most deaths
are made easier by modern pain relief. But the reality
is - not all are. I don't believe that if laws were
passed that they'd be misused. Today, most
Australians are born and die in hospitals under the
supervision of medical personnel. What I am questioning
is the fact that sometimes the personnel decide to
keep patients alive long beyond the point at which
they normally would have died.

Patients can be hooked up for days, months, or even
years to machines that sustain their lives, and this
step may be taken even if the patients are in constant
pain or even if they are permanently (or semi permanently)
comatose. So, technologies that were intended to save people
from unnecessary death may actually have the effect of
depriving them of a dignified death.

I therefore agree completely with those that say -
it should be a matter of choice -
especially for those who are hopelessly
terminally ill and are experiencing unrelievable suffering
with absolutely no chance of recovery.

"... sometimes the personnel decide to
keep patients alive long beyond the point at which
they normally would have died."

Foxy, I presented at the 'usual' public hospital on Feb 17, 2008 at around midnight with asthma: normally overnight stay w/ oxygen mask, conscious, gone before breakfast.

Five days later, they brought me out the coma. I was forced to endure morphine for asthma and had some strange and unwanted hallucinations due to mis-medication, but one thing I can't forget. The man in the adjoining bed that I could see suffering in silence mostly, but occasionally groaning, right in front of my bed, right before my eyes, for the next three days.

Therer was an old b&w photo on the window pillar of his younger days, taking a mark for what looked like Swan Districts Footy Club by the colours on his top. Now, both his arms and legs had been amputated at the elbows and knees. Unlikely that he'd ever take another mark for ANY footy club at that stage. What a ROTTEN photo to have to look at, thought I.

When I was moved out of the ICU in a private room for the last two days, I had nightmares about this poor fellow trying to attack me (walking on his stumps with no forearms - I could not fight him back) in a covered walkway by a weedy garden on an overcast late afternoon both nights, and the same nightmare continued every time I tried to sleep for the next week, so I stayed awake that week until the exhaustion and copious amounts of beer helped me finally sleep and forget.

I can't forget the misery and indignity that poor fellow suffered as his last days, and hope with all my heart that he made it to somewhere civilised after he died. I doubt that he would be still stuck in that terrible place today.

I must knock off posting for the night after this.

Thank you for your understanding, Foxy.