Posted on 10/24/2010 10:46:30 AM PDT by Daniel T. Zanoza
A hospice nurse was determined that my mom “go out” on her shift. She could have done it legally the way the script was written. Only because the nurse going off shift alerted us (and the VNA person in charge of sending MORE meds to the house thought it was unnecessary) was this woman stopped and removed from the home. Mom left this earth at God’s calling the next morning.
We filed a formal complaint - but it is peer review - and the script saved her license.
There are many horror stories out there - it will only get worse!
Now, in the US, we have hospices. In theory, a hospice is for someone who is at death's door. The hospital has done what it can, and there is no longer any real point to being in the ICU. Perhaps it's best to go home, be with family, and just pass on. In our modern society, that's about the most "natural" way anyone can die.
However, there is the matter of pain management. No one wants to see a loved one in pain, so when the hospice people start the morphine drip, it just seems like a kindness. What could be wrong?
Well, in my experience, hospice ends up amounting to assisted suicide. The morphine drip is increased day by day until it affects the breathing, and the patient dies. It almost seems like policy.
Maybe, if the patient really is going anyway, then this is a painless way to go. But I have a hard time with it. I think the medical establishment really is killing people in America.
The woman writing the first complaining paragraph would rather her mother live in excruciating bone cancer pain, than live pain-free in her final days.
People are born. People live. People die. Accept it.
So she was not a lucid as the daughter wanted her to be. She was pain free. Does this woman respect the concept of quality of life?
I have interviewed a number of family members who objected to hospice care. In every case, they were the sons and daughters who had ignored their parents and grandparents most of their adult life, but then objected when that parent exercised their freedom to die pain free.
Let me tell you something that I know about first hand.When your spouse is laying in bed gasping for air like a fish out of water, and a drip of morphine calms their breathing to where they die peacfuly instead of a violent gasp, then come back and talk to me about it. In todays medical world we can virtualy keep a body alive with machines to the point where the body itself is doing very little to stay alive.Hospitals are required to administer any and all life saving procedures unless the patient or gaurdian has signed a DNR, at that point the body is left to die on it’s own naturaly and if a simple drip of morphine makes it a peaceful departure instead of a violent one, tell me why shouldn’t it be used.
My mother had surgery when she was 84. During surgery, she had a major stroke and could no longer get around on her own. We put her in a nursing home for recovery. The nursing home, eventually, suggested that we move her into the regular nursing part of the home where they wanted her to stay. My mother couldn’t get around on her own but was mentally sharp. She wouldn’t say anything but I could tell that she hated the idea. We eventually moved her into a families home where she could be with her grand daughter, greatgrand son and great, greatgrand son.
The nursing home didn’t like this idea and the nursing home doctor said that she couldn’t be moved. I told them I wanted a second opinion and they changed their minds. My mother lasted another two years before she passed on, but was totally happy. In the nursing home, my mother knew that she would be lonely and alone. We didn’t want that.
It’s not easy taking care of someone like this but we figured that it wasn’t easy for her to raise us either. Now it was our turn to take care of her. Having her in our homes again was amazing. You wouldn’t believe the love that will over ride the job. Think twice, three times, before placing anyone in a nursing home.
You hit the nail on the head with what you said. The other scenario is a guilt complex some people have that they were the ones that “pulled the trigger”.
GET A WILL TO LIVE AT THE FOLLOWING SITE:
http://www.nrlc.org/euthanasia/willtolive/docs/new%20york.rev0309.pdf
It’s better than a Living Will, and has one for each state.
Anyone truly interested in this topic should read “The Nazi Doctors” by Robert J. Lifton.
I have been shouting this for years after the experience we had with my stepfather.
It would have been repeated with my mother last winter but I knew the tactics they would use and I would not back down. They would have “killed” her with over medication in early Nov. Instead she was alert and able to visit with family through Christmas and the New Year, dying at home early in Jan.
I have filed a complaint with the hospital, a well known and highly respected teaching facility.
Good for you.
A hosp. killed my Mother. Because the Drs saidher care was eating up their tax money
I share the sentiment of this author based on my experience. You make a ridiculous statement about hospice being some sort of all knowing, all wonderful entity as if it can do no wrong.
The author here reflects how her mother rapidly went from fully functioning independent one day to heavily medicated and out of it the next day, and dead a week later. I agree this may be a case of overmedication. We are dealing with sensitive issues here and you wildly make judgment about it being anti hospice. In my case, I was deeply troubled by the experience where each and every question and each visit just turned into a ‘turn up the meds’ response. I have read quite a bit about this type of situation and it does seem to be standard policy. We can’t operate like hospice is right just because it is hospice, and more than the common outlook that the government is always going to do what’s right.
Okay, okay. For your case okay, absolutely. Tortured death throes can be managed by modern drips. But, go into the hospital and before you see a “doctor” there, you get the Hospice pusher. This is before any death throes, but you’re barely checked into your room at the hospital. Your doctor does not come to visit you but some retired doctor, maybe 70ish, called a “hospitalist”, who drugs you so well, you are hustled off to Hospice within days. A total racket. Big money. Like no drug enforcement. More drugs, more drug rehabs. Big money. No rehab figures that amount to anything. Outrageous.
My father cancer alerted me to who aggressive these hospitals/hospices systems are .
The hospice kept harassing my step mom about letting them in the door.
I finally called this place and warned them I was going to contact state licensing board and Medicare if they continued to harass my family.
These vultures who were desperate to fill a empty hospice bed as well to get my family to switch their Medicare coverage to that Medicare hospice coverage ( a big mistake by the way).
By the way, ,my father passed away two years later at home in his bed.
***Now it was our turn to take care of her.***
Which is why you are not shouting and pointing fingers of blame.
There is so much guilt, inadequacy and sometimes greed about end of life arrangements for elderly family members. Physicians, not caregivers are authorized to administer treatment; which should be discussed and questioned in detail by the family member responsible for making decisions.
With so many advances in medicine to prolong/extend life - we must become informed and prepared to handle drug reactions and complications. Many elderly people are having surgical procedures well past prior life-expectancy. It’s expensive and not without risk of complications or death. Be thankful for the extra days of life, that they are pain-free and peaceful.
Cool. Can I decide when you die?
I was not refered to a hospice care giver until I requested it after a discusion with my wife and her doctor.The hospice care people were wonderfull in getting all equipment needed for her comfort here at home, the medical nurse and hygene nurses were very profesional.24 hour phone access for any questions needing answers. Immediate response when she died.I think the level of care depends on what state you live in. I was very grateful for them.
Our intellectual superiors want to drug boys instead of dealing with the fact that they behave like boys. Why shouldn't they drug old people, too?
When someone is a problem, just medicate them until they aren't.
My mother died of cancer 9 years ago and we had hospice for the last 6 weeks or so.
They were absolutely great! They did not intentionally dose her meds to end her life sooner. In fact, it would have been humane to have given her more meds during the last 12 hours of her life, even if it would have ended her life a few hours sooner. Cancer is a rough way to go and the last hours are torture.
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