I took care of a lady at the nursing home where I worked who was dying of pancreatic cancer. Pancreatic cancer is nasty. No cancer is fun, but pancreatic cancer is one of the most torturous in my opinion.
Anyway, the lady spent the last month of her life lying on a hospital bed with a disconnected feeding tube (that had moss colored material backing up into the tube, likely from a fecal impaction from the immobility and large doses of narcotic pain meds she was given. I didn't have much experience yet and didn't recognize the impaction, especially since she was no longer taking in any nutrition. Sad thing though, none of the other very experienced nurses did anything but give the woman pain pills and help her take her bone thin frame to the toilet. Until, that is, she could no longer walk.) I watched that lady die. It took her a moth, A MONTH to die. A MONTH. A MONTH of eating nothing but ice chips and asking the nurses, "Why am I still alive?" the doctor refused her request to help her commit suicide, and she finally died alone and absolutely miserable in a little nursing home bed that didn't even have a good window view even if she could get up to see or get past the pain to care. My best nursing judgment was to kill her. I didn't kill her because it was illegal to do so, but the "morally" and technically correct (if you start with the fundamental understanding that the nurse is the patient's advocate) thing to do would have been to overdose her on her pain medicine. I could have done it. I watched another lady have a stroke and lie in bed beckoning to me but unable to speak or eat or move one whole side of her body and much of the other. She had a living will that clarified her desire that there would be no feeding tube or IV fluids. It only took her about a week to dry up like a husk and die. I didn't kill her either, but I gave her the morphine she was prescribed every two hours just like it was ordered, although I wish the doctor would have prescribed some morphine for me. Liz -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Jason (Memphis) Sent: Thursday, October 02, 2008 1:53 PM To: Memphis Freethought Alliance Subject: Re: Oregon Leads If I remember correctly from living in California (right below Oregon), very few sick people who get a lethal dose actually kill themselves. I forget what the percentage is but I think that it's very low. However, I think people just like to know that if they want to die, they have the pills to take to die painlessly and with certainty. It's sort of like a control thing...or, if the pain/quality of life gets too bad, I can press the "end it" button but few people press that button. On Oct 2, 10:39 am, Clogtowner <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Hi y'all - just in case:http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/oct/02/law.health1 --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Memphis Freethought Alliance" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/memphisfreethoughtalliance?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
