Health Care Situation
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Introduction
Code of ethics guide many professions. These codes help the individuals and staff members make certain decisions. Health care workers, such as nurses, physicians, physical therapists, psychologists, pharmacists, have their individual codes of ethics. When a variety of health care workers come together there is a single code for the organization. In health care, staff is responsible for patients first, society, and other health care professionals. The codes of ethics are not laws and according to American Medical Association (2001), ethics are, “standards of conduct which define the essentials of honorable behavior” (AMA Code of Medical Ethics, para. 1).
In health care there are challenging situations that may require applying certain ethical principles or experience to help with making decisions. Some ethical decisions that health care workers are faced with include, patient care conflicts, substandard patient care, poor communication, lack in accountability, physical harm and lack of respect toward patients or fellow professionals, and a lack of professionalism, (Cordingley, Hyde, Peters, Vernon, & Bundy, 2007). Ethics and ethical decision making is not something that can be learned only in school. Medical staff needs support in ethical challenges throughout their professional careers. The opportunity is rarely given when medical students are involved in their clinical portion of learning. According to Cordingley, et. al. (2007), “research suggests that only a minority of students make use of the support available,” (Medical Education, p. 1203). Although ethical issues are a part of the medical profession, many larger issues can influence personal ethics as well as ethical decision in the workplace.
Physician assisted suicide is a very sensitive and debatable topic of todays world. In the world of medicine today, in most scenarios, almost every attempt is made to keep a patient alive. It is even possible to keep a person alive even if brain dead, by the use of life support machines and other life sustaining equipment. There is medication now that will prolong the life of AIDS patients and chemotherapy that will hopefully rid cancer patients of their disease. Most people do what they can to fight their diseases to stay alive. However, there are some patients who have been diagnosed with a terminal illness, and they do not wish to try and prolong their lives. Some people foresee that due to their illness, they will have much pain and suffering ahead, and they wish not to endure. Or some patients have been battling terminal diseases for a long period of time, and they are tired from their fight. These patients may decide that they no longer wish to live. Some see physician assisted suicide as an alternative to the years of suffering and pain.
What exactly is an assisted suicide? According to J.M. Dieterle, a professor at Eastern Michigan University, Physician-assisted suicide (PAS) is the voluntary termination of ones own life by administration of a lethal substance with the direct or indirect assistance of a physician. PAS is the practice of providing a competent patient with a prescription for medication for the patient to use with the primary intention of ending his or her own life (2008). Currently in the United States, Washington State and Oregon are the only two states that allow this practice. Ethical issues, dilemmas, arguments and attitudes surrounding the topic of PAS will be analyzed and discussed. In addition, the four principles of ethics in relation to PAS examined.
Ethical Implications of PAS
Ethical standards within healthcare refer to those standards that impose the reasonable obligations on healthcare workers to refrain from manipulating the system to obtain benefits for them to the extensive disadvantage of the healthcare service users. It also includes standards relating to rights, such as the right to life. The basic rights of human beings, such as concern for personal dignity, are always of importance, and it is extremely important and vital to protect these rights, especially during illness. Alleviating the suffering and pain of patients are moral obligations of healthcare, and central to its purpose (Morrison, 2011, p. 48).
Taking into consideration terminally ill patients, healthcare providers and doctors are obliged to reducing the severity of the suffering and pain caused by the illness and alleviating the symptoms without curing the underlying disease. In the past few years, there has been an increasing demand by terminally ill patients to make independent decisions regarding their own fate and medical assistance to end their intolerable lives. This phenomenon is often referred to as euthanasia, which can be defined as “a quiet, painless death, and the intentional putting to death of a person with an incurable or painful disease intended as an act of mercy” (Sanders & Chaloner, 2007). As a result, euthanasia has become one of the most pressing and profound issue confronting society and has become the focus of much debate, leaving most physicians with an ethical dilemma when taking care of patients at the end of their lives. Euthanasia has been accepted both legally and morally in various forms and in many societies. The moral significance of euthanasia is inevitably connected with the way others understand the value of life and what it is to uphold and protect that value.
Generally, euthanasia is classified as either voluntary or involuntary. Voluntary euthanasia can be defined as, “to hasten the death of an individual at his or her request” (Sanders & Chaloner, 2007). Voluntary euthanasia is generally performed on terminally ill patients. The patient will make a request that the