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To: caseinpoint
My medical power of attorney spells out quite clearly. No Code, no machines and I am thinking of getting a tattoo on my chest that states NO CODE..Worked in the hospital for over 10 years and saw some really nasty codes that brought back a vegetable...I don't want to hold onto life if I cannot live it. A body in a bed is not life. But I wouldn't make that decision for another person...We should all have a medical power of attorney and be quite specific as to our instructions....
15 posted on 04/08/2009 12:09:19 AM PDT by goat granny
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To: goat granny

That’s a good approach. The whoel question revolving around Terry was whether her intent could be implied from some off-handed remark she made to her husband that was completely at odds with her professed faith.

I do living wills for people and it is the rare person who wants to ensure that everything possible must be done to keep him or her alive. On other other hand, they like about a three-pronged test of whether to pull the plug: (1) unconscious or vegetative state, (2) almost no chance of recovery to a sentient live, and (3) extent of life support needed to maintain life, including whether it would entail pain.

About fourteen months ago a dear friend chose to pull the plug. He had ALS and the paralysis had slowly crept up his body to his ear level. He could communicate only by his eyes and was totally dependent on respirator and tube feedings to live. He spent two years in this condition in a “rehabilitation” hospital as he shrank from perhaps 400 lbs to around 150 lbs (he was about 6’4”), a big, burly, lovable bear of a Finnish husband and father. He surprised his wife and the rest of us by requesting the respirator be removed in mid-December 2007. We were there with him at the time. He was surrounded by his family and friends, his ecclesiastical leader, doctors, nurses and therapists who respected him. There was no question that this was his choice, he knew what he was doing, and he was not afraid of death. It was, to use a very inadequate word, an awesome experience to watch him transition from this life to the next.

I oppose euthanasia and I don’t know how much this retarded man can know or appreciate, but I do have compassion for the sisters who see a terminally ill man maintained on a respirator in a hopeless condition. It was difficult enough for my friend to stay on the respirator, and he had full faculty of mind. It would be difficult to see that intrusive treatment for someone who could not understand why this was happening to him.


16 posted on 04/08/2009 8:00:57 AM PDT by caseinpoint (Don't get thickly involved in thin things)
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