Euthanasia News and Research

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Today's Opinions: GOP rerun; Finding bipartisanship; Pawlenty's legacy

You just can't close the door on this crowd. The party that brought us the worst economy since the Great Depression, that led us into Iraq and the worst foreign policy disaster in American history, that would like to take a hammer to Social Security and a chisel to Medicare, is back in control of the House of Representatives with the expressed mission of undermining all things Obama (Bob Herbert, 1/3).

4 Jan 2011

Today's Opinions: End-of-life counseling; Rising costs of boomers; Controlling infections in hospitals

Death panels. Government-sponsored euthanasia. Pulling the plug on grandma. Those were just some of the blatantly false terms conservatives threw around last year to scare Congress into stripping a provision out of the health-reform bill that would have allowed Medicare to reimburse doctors for providing voluntary, end-of-life counseling to their patients. The scare tactics worked (1/2).

3 Jan 2011

Glenn Foundation awards $60,000 grant to Scripps' scientist for biomedical research

While scientists depend on grants for their research, applying for them is a long and frequently frustrating process. For one Scripps Research Institute scientist, however, the process was shorter.

19 Nov 2010

Kim Hames says case was not euthanasia

Western Australia has been debating euthanasia for a while and in a new development, Health Minister and Deputy Premier Kim Hames has admitted that as a GP he administered the painkiller morphine to hasten a cancer patient's death. He said in his statement that what he had done was legal and not euthanasia – which he opposed. His reasoning was that the pain relieving medication was intended to ease a patient's suffering rather than end their life.

23 Sep 2010

Legal and moral reasons prevent most Oregon hospices from participation in 'Death with Dignity Act'

A survey in the latest issue of the Hastings Center Report found that most hospices in Oregon, the first state to legalize physician-assistance in dying, either do not participate in or have limited participation in requests for such assistance. Both legal and moral reasons are identified.

10 Sep 2010

Role of doctors' religious faith and ethnicity in taking ethically controversial decisions during end-of-life care

Atheist or agnostic doctors are almost twice as willing to take decisions that they think will hasten the end of a very sick patient's life as doctors who are deeply religious, suggests research published online in the Journal of Medical Ethics.

26 Aug 2010

Investigators explore legal, ethical permissibility of carrying out request specific to VAD

Patients have the right to refuse or request the withdrawal of any unwanted treatment. In an article published in the online issue of Mayo Clinic Proceedings, investigators explore the legal and ethical permissibility of carrying out such a request specific to a ventricular assist device.

3 Aug 2010

Bioethics through the lens of literature

What if I were grown only so that my organs could be harvested, and I had to care for others whose organs are being taken, too, while I wait for my own death? What if doctors cut off a piece of the tumor that killed me and grew it in a lab for the next sixty years? What if scientists discovered a gene that would ensure my happiness no matter what life throws at me?

16 Jul 2010

GOP questions Berwick's ties to industry

The Hill reports that Republicans are charging the Obama administration with evading questions on Dr. Donald Berwick's ties to the health care industry. President Barack Obama used a recess appointment this week to install Berwick as head of the agency that oversees Medicare and Medicaid after key Republicans had raised concerns about Berwick's views.

12 Jul 2010

First Edition: July 9, 2010

Today's health policy headlines include news about some little-known health reform provisions and how the Obama administration is using technology to help consumers navigate changes resulting from the health overhaul.

9 Jul 2010

Forensic pathologists chronicle phenomenon of doctors who kill

Most people have heard of the Hippocratic Oath, taken by doctors committed to practicing medicine ethically. What happens though when doctors, those dedicated to healing and preserving life, cross the line and kill?

10 Jun 2010

Use of life-ending drugs without explicit patient request occurs in hospital, among elderly patients

Despite fears to the contrary, the use of drugs to end life without patient request has not increased since euthanasia was legalized in Belgium, states an article in CMAJ.

19 May 2010

Study looks at the experiences of nurses with euthanasia, other end-of-life decisions

Nurses in Belgium who administer life-ending drugs in euthanasia and in cases without explicit patient request often act outside of the law, according to a study in CMAJ.

18 May 2010

MRSA Survivors Network to raise awareness on MRSA infections

More Americans die annually from invasive methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus infections than from HIV/AIDS, H1N1 influenza and Parkinson's disease, yet the United States and many other countries' health officials continue to ignore the global crisis.

12 May 2010

Euthanasia: Defining actions and terms, and promoting honest debate needed

It is time to discard the word euthanasia because it mixes ideas and values that confuses the debate about dying, states an editorial in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal)

30 Mar 2010

The Nutro Company announces $50,000 donation to SDF

As search and rescue teams return home from Haiti this week, The Nutro Company, a wholly owned subsidiary of Mars, Incorporated, today announced a $50,000 donation to the Search Dog Foundation (SDF). SDF is a California-based organization that deployed six canine disaster search teams to assist in the search and rescue operations in Haiti.

30 Jan 2010

FRC announces phone call campaign to express opposition to health care reform

As Congress prepares to vote on a health care overhaul plan, Family Research Council (FRC) today announced an eight week campaign to call all household phones in Louisiana to survey each household on provisions of the Senate health care bill.

5 Dec 2009

Lawmakers at health reform crossroads

As Senate health bill consideration approaches a critical point, Majority Leader Harry Reid has taken ownership of it, The New York Times reports. "Should Mr. Reid shepherd the measure successfully through the Senate and meld it with the House version into final legislation that President Obama can sign, it would be the biggest accomplishment of his career." If he fails it would be a hard defeat for Democrats and him, especially when he faces a tough re-election campaign at home in Nevada (Hulse, 11/19).

20 Nov 2009

Senate urged to cast an unconditional NO vote on the cloture motion to proceed to the health care bill

Last evening, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) unveiled his 2, 074-page health care bill, the Patient Protection and Affordable Health Care Act. Not only is less strict, less-than-Stupak abortion funding language contained in Reid's bill, but there is still nothing in place to remedy the problem that is the underlying mechanism for carrying out single-payer, government-run health care - the rationing of life-saving medical treatments and placing the most intimate health decisions of every American in the hands of Washington bureaucrats.

19 Nov 2009

Palin resurrects 'death panel' claims, controversy is decades-old

Sarah Palin has returned to the battle over health care reform with a familiar refrain, slamming what she and others dubbed 'death panels' over the summer. Following passage of the health care overhaul in the House on Saturday night, Palin took to her Facebook page to register her well-known opposition to the Democratic plan.

11 Nov 2009