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A paper on Doctors Participation in Physician-Assisted Suicide

A paper on Doctors Participation in Physician-Assisted Suicide

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Running Head: NURSING PAPER 1

Doctors Participation in Physician-Assisted Suicide

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Doctors Participation in Physician-Assisted Suicide

The society holds deep faith in doctors as healers, or as people who help save the lives of

others by treating their illnesses or curing their diseases. However, an inherent risk arises in the

society whenever this faith dampens as to their discovery of the way doctors assist people to end

their lives instead of saving. Nowadays, there are numerous cases of physician-aided suicides,

whereby a physician, or a qualified medical practitioner trained and charged with the duty of

saving lives, assists an individual to end his or her life. Aided suicide in general refers to suicide

committed through support from another party, or a number of persons, commonly confused for

euthanasia or mercy killing. This happens in most cases whereby a relative, friend or physician

assists another person to put an end to their lives in order to reduce prolonged suffering,

especially in the case of terminal illnesses such as cancer (Guido, 2010).

In a physician-aided suicide, a physician provides the necessary means of ending a life,

and the patient puts this information into good use by terminating their lives. It is not similar to

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NURSING PAPER 2

mercy killing whereby the physician gets his or her hands dirty by performing the suicidal act.

Physician aided suicides are not new occurrences within our society but have been in existence

for a long time. This is because most people opt for death as a way of bringing to a stop their

endless suffering. Most physicians receive a request from patients or other non-patients who

want to commit suicide for assistance in the best ways to end their lives. This is through the great

advances made through medicine, which acts quickly in killing an individual instead of having to

go through traditional suicidal procedures such as hanging, drug overdose, or throwing oneself

over a cliff or a storey building (Jeffrey, 2009).

It is very wrong and quite unethical for a physician to assist a patient or any other

individual to end their lives. As such, both the patients, as well as, the physician are liable for

prosecution, charged by murder, or attempted murder if the procedure fails or the victim gets the

right assistance within the right time. It is therefore advisable for physicians to turn down

requests from patients to assist them in committing suicide. Physicians should always follow the

two main principles of medicine practice. The first principle outlines that a physician is obligated

to relieve suffering and pain of a patient, as well as promote the dignity of dying patient who are

under their care. This means that they have to take all the necessary steps to assist patients

recover, and if they have o die, let them die in a dignified legal manner instead of killing them

(Pozgar, 2013).

The second principle of the bodily integrity of a patient stipulates that a physician should

always respect the competent decisions of their patients if they choose to forgo their life-

sustaining treatment. This is legal as long as they do not assist them in ending their lives. They

should simply let their patients succumb to the diseases or illnesses that they are suffering from,

but not assist in ringing a fast death upon them by giving them a drug that would speed up their

deaths, or bring their suffering to a speedy stop (Weir, 1997).

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Doctors Participation in Physician-Assisted Suicide Name Instructor Date Doctors Participation in Physician-Assisted Suicide The society holds deep faith in doctors as healers, or as people who help save the lives of others by treating their illnesses or curing their diseases. However, an inherent risk arises in the society whenever this faith dampens as to their discovery of the way doctors assist people to end their lives instead of saving. Nowadays, there are numerous cases of physician-aided suicides, whereby a physician, or a qualified medical practitioner trained and charged with the duty of saving lives, assists an individual to end his or her life. Aided suicide in general refers to suicide committed through support from another party, or a number of persons, commonly confused for euthanasia or mercy killing. This happens in most cases whereby a relative, frien ...
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