A British woman suffering from multiple sclerosis (MS) has challenged the British legal system by demanding clarification on assisted suicide.
Debbie Purdy, 45, from Bradford, wants a guarantee that her husband, Omar Puente, will not be prosecuted if he helps her to end her life.
Ms Purdy was diagnosed with primary progressive MS in March 1995 and now can no longer walk and is gradually losing strength in her upper body.
At some point she wants to travel to Switzerland to take a lethal dose of barbiturates prescribed by doctors at Dignitas but wants her husband to be at her side when she dies.
Ms Purdy is concerned he may be prosecuted on his return to Britain because aiding or abetting a suicide is a crime punishable by up to 14 years imprisonment.
To date the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) has not prosecuted any relative of more than 100 UK citizens who have travelled to Dignitas to die but how that decision has been reached has never been made clear.
Ms Purdy successfully appealed in June for a judicial review in the High Court on the grounds that the DPP had acted illegally by not providing guidance and argued earlier this month at a hearing that the lack of clarification was a breach of her human rights.
Sir Ken Macdonald, counsel for the DPP, said the assurance Ms Purdy was seeking could not be given as assisted suicide was illegal - but this is not the first time the issue has been raised in the courts.
In 2001 Diane Pretty, who had motor neurone disease, failed to get immunity from prosecution for her husband if he helped her to die in the UK and several other attempts to legalise assisted suicide in Britain have also been rejected, most recently in 2006.
This is the second high-profile case to challenge Britain's position on euthanasia, while it is not illegal to kill yourself in the UK it is illegal to help someone else to die.
Assisted suicide is legal in Holland, Luxembourg, Belgium, Switzerland and the American state of Oregon.