Posted on 09/03/2014 11:16:03 AM PDT by chessplayer
Years ago, Charlie, a highly respected orthopedist and a mentor of mine, found a lump in his stomach. He had a surgeon explore the area, and the diagnosis was pancreatic cancer. This surgeon was one of the best in the country. He had even invented a new procedure for this exact cancer that could triple a patient’s five-year-survival odds–from 5 percent to 15 percent–albeit with a poor quality of life. Charlie was uninterested. He went home the next day, closed his practice, and never set foot in a hospital again. He focused on spending time with family and feeling as good as possible. Several months later, he died at home. He got no chemotherapy, radiation, or surgical treatment. Medicare didn’t spend much on him.
It’s not a frequent topic of discussion, but doctors die, too. And they don’t die like the rest of us. What’s unusual about them is not how much treatment they get compared to most Americans, but how little. For all the time they spend fending off the deaths of others, they tend to be fairly serene when faced with death themselves. They know exactly what is going to happen, they know the choices, and they generally have access to any sort of medical care they could want. But they go gently.
Of course, doctors don’t want to die; they want to live. But they know enough about modern medicine to know its limits. And they know enough about death to know what all people fear most: dying in pain, and dying alone.
(Excerpt) Read more at time.com ...
I’m on the fence with this sort of thing. While part of me wants to fight if diagnosed with a terminal disease, the quality of life issues certainly play a role, esp. when considering the indeterminate nature of some diseases like cancer. Do you spend years pumping poison into your veins for a 40% chance to live another 10 years, or do you take your prognosis, maybe go the palliative care route, and love what little time you do have left?
Dying without Christ is what I would fear.
I see the same with my profession.
If I were them, I'd spend any amount of Other People's Money to postpone meeting God, too. :)
What’s your profession?
The left has always pushed the death theme, it is what they do.
He is a vetvet.
It’s a complicated question with many different answers.
A veterinarian?
Thanks.
Makes sense.
Death Panels
I’m assuming a veteran veterinarian.
I wasn’t aware that to do CPR right it involved breaking ribs. I don’t want my last hrs to be filled with pain.
No thanks
On 17 April 1955, Albert Einstein experienced internal bleeding caused by the rupture of an abdominal aortic aneurysm, which had previously been reinforced surgically by Dr. Rudolph Nissen in 1948. He took the draft of a speech he was preparing for a television appearance commemorating the State of Israel's seventh anniversary with him to the hospital, but he did not live long enough to complete it.Einstein refused surgery, saying: "I want to go when I want. It is tasteless to prolong life artificially. I have done my share, it is time to go. I will do it elegantly." He died in Princeton Hospital early the next morning at the age of 76, having continued to work until near the end.
Source: Wikipedia.
Having watched my first wife die from cancer over the course of 6-1/2 years I learned enough oncology to know this. I will take the most aggressive first course of treatment I can bear. If the cancer goes away, great. If it comes back, I’m buying a ticket to Bali or Tahiti. Then I’m coming home, see my family and friends and when it begins to hurt every day, there’s a nice bit of woods behind my house and a little .22 pistol in my safe.
I hope to go fairly early instead of burning up the kids inheritances. Load up on the painkillers and float away.
Author trying to show the nobility of death panels.
CPR doesn’t always break ribs. But with frail, elderly people broken ribs are almost certain.
It’s my take that if someone is already dying of an incurable disease, CPR is cruel and goes against a peaceful death.
On the other side, one of my professors said that her mother was dying of cancer, and was resuscitated with CPR. They had another month together that was precious to both of them and set some things right.
Load up on the painkillers and float away.
My feelings, exactly.
"The US Army Veterinary Corps provides food safety and security inspections for all of the Armed Services. We also are responsible for providing care to Military Working Dogs, ceremonial horses, working animals of many Department of Homeland Security organizations, and pets owned by service members."
Fascinating.
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