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Oregon Health Plan ethics soiled: assisted suicide offered over treatment for term...
Keep in mind that this is a Fox news article....
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Some terminally ill patients in Oregon who turned to their state for health care were denied treatment and offered doctor-assisted suicide instead, a proposal some experts have called a "chilling" corruption of medical ethics.
Since the spread of his prostate cancer, 53-year-old Randy Stroup of Dexter, Ore., has been in a fight for his life. Uninsured and unable to pay for expensive chemotherapy, he applied to Oregon's state-run health plan for help.
Lane Individual Practice Association (LIPA), which administers the Oregon Health Plan in Lane County, responded to Stroup's request with a letter saying the state would not cover Stroup's pricey treatment, but would pay for the cost of physician-assisted suicide.
"It dropped my chin to the floor," Stroup told FOX News. "[How could they] not pay for medication that would help my life, and yet offer to pay to end my life?"
The letter, which has been sent to other terminal patients throughout Oregon, follows guidelines established by the state legislature.
Oregon doesn't cover life-prolonging treatment unless there is better than a 5 percent chance it will help the patients live for five more years — but it covers doctor-assisted suicide, defining it as a means of providing comfort, no different from hospice care or pain medication.
"It's chilling when you think about it," said Dr. William Toffler, a professor of family medicine at Oregon Health & Science University. "It absolutely conveys to the patient that continued living isn't worthwhile."
In issuing their latest Prioritized List of Health Services, state officials reported a new emphasis on preventive care and cost effectiveness. Dr. John Sattenspiel, LIPA's senior medical director, defended the measures.
"I have had patients who would consider knowing that this is part of that range of comfort care or palliative care services that are still available to them, they would be comforted by that," Sattenspiel said. "It really depends on the individual patient."
Toffler called it a callous practice that went against medical convention. "It corrupts the consistent medical ethic that has been in place for 2,000 years," he said. "It's absolutely breathtaking."
Oregon is the only state to legalize doctor-assisted suicide, which came into effect in 1997. Since that time, there have been 341 reported cases where doctors provided lethal doses of medicine to patients to end their lives.
Oregon voters have upheld the "Death with Dignity" law three times, and Sattenspiel says it is the state's duty to inform patients of all their legal options.
For Stroup, however, suicide was never an option. He fought back, and the Oregon Health Plan eventually reversed its decision and is now paying for his chemotherapy, giving him hope he'll be around a little longer for his 80-year-old mother and five grandchildren. Keep in mind that this is a Fox news article.... ++++++++++++++++++++++++++ ... more -
Oregon Health Plan won't pay for cancer treatment, but it will pay for assist...
The Oregon Health plan made a controversial decision to not cover a cancer treatment for a patient that would cost $4000. They instead sent a letter telling the patient that they would pay for the medications for her to commit suicide.
What do you think about this?
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Excerpt.....
SPRINGFIELD, Ore. -- Barbara Wagner has one wish - for more time.
"I'm not ready, I'm not ready to die," the Springfield woman said. "I've got things I'd still like to do."
Her doctor offered hope in the new chemotherapy drug Tarceva, but the Oregon Health Plan sent her a letter telling her the cancer treatment was not approved.
Instead, the letter said, the plan would pay for comfort care, including "physician aid in dying," better known as assisted suicide.
"I told them, I said, 'Who do you guys think you are?' You know, to say that you'll pay for my dying, but you won't pay to help me possibly live longer?' " Wagner said.
An unfortunate interpretation?
Dr. Som Saha, chairman of the commission that sets policy for the Oregon Health Plan, said Wagner is making an "unfortunate interpretation" of the letter and that no one is telling her the health plan will only pay for her to die.
One critic of assisted suicide calls the message disturbing nonetheless.
"People deserve relief of their suffering, not giving them an overdose," said Dr. William Toffler.
He said the state has a financial incentive to offer death instead of life: Chemotherapy drugs such as Tarceva cost $4,000 a month while drugs for assisted suicide cost less than $100. The Oregon Health plan made a controversial decision to not cover a cancer treatment for a patient that would cost $4000. They instead... more -
Milan court authorises euthanasia
"A Milan appeals court on Wednesday authorised the suspension of the life support system of a young woman who has been in an irreversible coma for the past 16 years.
The ruling, which immediately sparked both applause and criticism, came amid a legislative void in Italy on issues such as living wills and related end-of-life questions.
Englaro's elderly father had been trying to have his daughter's life support system turned of since 1999 in order to free his daughter from ''the inhumane and degrading condition in which she is forced to exist''.
He argued that his daughter, who was injured in a car crash in her Lombardy hometown of Lecco in 1992 when she was 19, said plainly during her life that she would not wish to live in a vegetative state."
Picture: http://flickr.com/photos/brykmantra/76765412/ "A Milan appeals court on Wednesday authorised the suspension of the life support system of a young woman who has been in an irre... more -
Dr. Death makes ballot for seat in Congress
Assisted suicide advocate Jack Kevorkian has collected enough signatures to be on the November ballot as a congressional candidate in Michigan. Assisted suicide advocate Jack Kevorkian has collected enough signatures to be on the November ballot as a congressional candidate in ... more
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Do we all have a right to choose suicide?
When Roger Kusch helped Bettina Schardt kill herself at home on Saturday, the grim, carefully choreographed ritual was like that in many cases of assisted suicide, with one exception.
Ms. Schardt, 79, a retired X-ray technician from the Bavarian city of Würzburg, was neither sick nor dying. She simply did not want to move into a nursing home, and rather than face that prospect, she asked Mr. Kusch, a prominent German campaigner for assisted suicide, for a way out.
Beate Merk, the justice minister of Bavaria, said in an interview. “This woman had nothing wrong other than her fear. He didn’t offer her any other options.”
A former senior government official from Hamburg, Mr. Kusch, 53, said he would help other people like her who decide of their own free will to commit suicide.
Assisted sucide for those physically suffering is one thing but what about if you just don't feel like you have a good quality of life anymore? Would you search out whatever options presented themself to you in order to be fulfilled...even if that meant killing yourself? When Roger Kusch helped Bettina Schardt kill herself at home on Saturday, the grim, carefully choreographed ritual was like that in ma... more -
Assisted and videotaped suicide of healthy 79-year old renews debate
Bettina Schardt, a healthy 79-year old woman, killed herself in her home in the Bavarian city of Würzburg on Saturday. What makes the case more problematic and controversial is the fact that Schardt's was an assisted suicide, carefully planned and carried out with the help of Roger Kusch. According to Kusch, he mentored Schardt, but neither provided nor administered the lethal cocktail of the antimalaria drug chloroquine and the sedative diazepam that led to her death.
Schardt was neither sick nor dying, but did not want to spend the rest of her life in a nursing home and decided to kill herself instead. In order to carry out her wish, she approached Kusch, a prominent German campaigner for assisted suicide.
Schardt's death has caused great controversy in Germany, not least because of Kusch's effort to publicise it. At a press conference on Monday, Kusch gave a detailed account of Schardt's last moments and reported that he filmed several interviews with Schardt, which prove her strong desire to die. Furthermore, he declared that he had installed a camera to film Schardt's death and to prove that he did not play a role in her actual suicide. According to Kusch, the footage shows that he left the room after Schardt had drunk the poisonous drug mixture and returned three hours later to find the old woman dead.
Even though neither suicide nor aiding a suicide are crimes in Germany, as long as the line into euthanasia or mercy killing is not crossed, Kusch has been criticised widely for not trying to help Schardt in other ways. Furthermore, the effective self-advertisement of his services has caused a national outcry as Kusch used the media-attention to declare he was willing to help others end their lives.
Germany’s chancellor, Angela Merkel, declared on a German news channel on Wednesday, “I am absolutely against any form of assisted suicide, in whatever guise it comes.” Bettina Schardt, a healthy 79-year old woman, killed herself in her home in the Bavarian city of Würzburg on Saturday. What makes the ... more -
Cancer victim Chantal Sebire found dead at home
The French woman who made headlines across the world due to her battle with a horrifying facial cancer has been found dead at her home today.
Chantal Sebire was left so distresingly disfigured by the rare esthesioneuroblastoma (ENB) - an uncommon malignant neoplasm of the nasal vault - that she appealed for the legal right to end her own life.
Earlier this week a court in Dijon, eastern France, rejected Sebire's request to be "accompanied to her death with dignity". The French woman who made headlines across the world due to her battle with a horrifying facial cancer has been found dead at her home... more -
Euthanasia plea rejected in France
This woman has an incurable condition that has left her without the sense of smell, taste and sight. She's asked for the right to "depart peacefully" so that she no longer has to suffer. But in France, the euthanasia laws only allow families to request the life-support equipment for a terminally ill patient to be switched off. The laws do not allow a doctor to prescribe life-ending drugs. She appealed to the courts, and to the entire country of France, but has been denied. She now says she'll have to take the matter into her own hands. Do you think that euthanasia laws should be extended to cover situations like hers? This woman has an incurable condition that has left her without the sense of smell, taste and sight. She's asked for the right to... more
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