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Arguments Against Physician Assisted Suicide

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Physician Assisted Suicide Physician assisted suicide or P.A.S., is a widely-discussed argument around the world. It is the idea of a doctor using lethal doses of drugs to help end someone’s life due to suffering, and in terms doing so without authority. When thinking about the idea of this taking place many different thoughts arise when considering morals and a person’s rights. Many believe that it should be illegal partly due to the idea that it is morally and ethically wrong. While others believe it should be legalized in more states when thinking about how other feel who are suffering. Physician assisted suicide should be legal in the United states under certain circumstances such as a person is suffering tremendously, such person is incapable …show more content…

When considering the ethics behind doctors giving dosages of medication to help end their lives, the doctor’s oath plays a part. Many people find it hypocritical for a doctor to give up on a patient so easily just because they wish to die. When becoming a doctor you agree to the oath and the idea that you will do anything and everything in your power to save a patient’s life when needed. With that being said, when a doctor ends a patient’s life with lethal drugs he or she is simply giving up hope that there is a cure to make that patient better in time. Many doctors believe that miracles happen and they see them on a daily basis everywhere. So why stick to the idea that killing a patient, even with their consent, is the correct thing to do in certain situations? People also put into perspective the thought that patients have the ability to sign a DNR (do not resuscitate). When patients are critical, they get the option to sign a DNR stating that when their heart happens to stop or they stop breathing, you do not have the right to help resuscitate them under any circumstances. Doctors should be helping patients to the best of their ability and if that patient happens to code (stop breathing or cardiac arrest) then they may have the opportunity to help end the patient’s life with the legal document …show more content…

Currently physician assisted suicide is only legal in 7 states within the United states. Those for the legalization of physician assisted suicide are also thinking about this situation in an ethical manner. They believe that patients have the right to say whether or not it is their time to go. If a patient is suffering or hooked up to multiple ventilators and machines while lying in a hospital bed, then they should have the right to legally let a doctor help them die through their authority. When considering the idea of legalizing it, people like to make you think about the idea of you being in that person’s shoes. What if you were the one hooked up to all these different machines helping you survive. Imagine that being you and wanting to just be able to end your life and no longer face the agony of not being able to live your life the way that you should be able to. When thinking about being put under those circumstances, having physician assisted suicide being legally mandated isn’t a terrible nor unethical decision. “While Americans consider themselves free to live the lives they choose, most don't realize that this freedom ends when it comes to selecting a peaceful death over a life filled with unbearable pain and suffering,” (Faye Girsh, 2002). Girsh believes that as Americans we have the unalienable right known as freedom, but once it comes to making a decision on whether you can

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1869 Words | 8 Pages

Physician-Assisted Suicide and its Ethical Dilemma Alexandra N. Gionta California State Polytechnic University, Pomona Physician-Assisted Suicide and its Ethical Dilemma Introduction As an aspiring nurse in California, an ethical dilemma that I am likely to come across is that involved with patient euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide (PAS). In voluntary active Euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide, a doctor administers a treatment upon request of the patient that will initiate their tranquil death. This is usually done in the case that the patient is of a certain age and diagnosed with a terminal illness that causes them suffering. A common misconception is that PAS is the same as euthanasia, but there is a distinct difference between the two.

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1026 Words | 5 Pages

Physician- assisted suicide is the practice of providing terminally ill patients a prescription for medication to use with the intention of ending his or her life. According to the article “What’s Really Involved in Physician-Assisted Death?” pain was not the main reason patients made the request of physician-assisted suicide but ratherm loss of autonomy and dignity, inability to enjoy life and regular activities and other types of mental distress were the dominant motivations, the study found. Physician- assisted suicide should be legal for terminally ill patients. The patient’s family will not have to suffer and want have to watch the patients suffer for so long. Before starting physician- assisted suicide, it is made sure of that this is what the patient truly wants.

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739 Words | 3 Pages

Physician-assisted suicide is a widely controversial issue that is discussed in today society. There are debates over whether it is ethically correct or whether assisted suicide should be legalized for the terminally ill. Each side of the arguments have different viewpoints concerning individual aspects of physician-assisted suicide. Such as certain guidelines that should exist if legalized. Advocates of physician-assisted suicide argue that it should be legal under circumstances such as great suffering through terminals illness.

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791 Words | 4 Pages

Physician assisted suicide should be decriminalized because, from an ethical and economic perspective, those with terminal diseases have a right to choose death. Many patients feel that even though they will eventually die due to their illness that ending their life will be the best way in the end, but due to expenses they can not

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1179 Words | 5 Pages

The medical field is filled with opportunities and procedures that are used to help improve a patient’s standard of living and allow them to be as comfortable as possible. Physician assisted suicide (PAS) is a method, if permitted by the government, that can be employed by physicians across the world as a way to ease a patient’s pain and suffering when all else fails. PAS is, “The voluntary termination of one's own life by administration of a lethal substance with the direct or indirect assistance of a physician.”-Medicinenet.com. This procedure would be the patient’s decision and would allow the patient to end their lives in a more peaceful and comfortable way, rather than suffering until the illness takes over completely. Physician assisted suicide should be permitted by the government because it allows patients to end their suffering and to pass with dignity, save their families and the hospital money, and it allows doctors to preserve vital organs to save

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577 Words | 3 Pages

The concept associated with Physician Assisted Suicide holds a critical position within the contemporary generation as a number of different perspectives exist based on slippery slope arguments surrounding ethical understanding. Based on my current knowledge, my conceptual ideas, support the pro aspect behind physician assisted suicide for various reasons. For instance, free will and autonomy (Wong, dartmouth.edu) when it comes to life and death, terminal illness that has no possible cure and lastly, being able to provide the assistance in order to end the suffering being experienced by the patient as well as the family if the patient chooses to carry out the euthanasia. Further, individuals within society are permitted to practice natural human rights and should be given the

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1448 Words | 6 Pages

Oath states “I will not give a lethal drug to anyone if I am asked, nor will I advise such a plan.” (Pickert). A doctor’s job is to save lives and heal others, no person should have the right to take a person’s life away. For many years, doctors were required to pledge

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946 Words | 4 Pages

Physician assisted suicide, although legal in some states, should remain illegal because it goes against religious and moral beliefs. “In physician assisted suicide, the physician provides the necessary means or information and the patient performs the act” (Endlink). Supporters of assisted-suicide laws believe that mentally competent people who are in misery and have no chance of long-term survival, should have the right to die if and when they choose. I agree that people should have the right to refuse life-saving treatments, written in the patient bill of rights.

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536 Words | 3 Pages

Physician-Assisted Suicide Physician-assisted suicide is when a doctor provides the means and the information necessary for a patient to end his life. A bill legalizing physician-assisted suicide was recently signed into law in California, and four other states have also legalized physician-assisted suicide. While many people may say that physician-assisted suicide should not be legal, the fact of the matter is that assisted suicide is a way to end a terminally ill patient’s suffering, and therefore should be legal. All doctors must abide by a very strict code of medical ethics. One of the biggest arguments against physician-assisted suicide is that it violates the Hippocratic oath, which is a code of medical ethics which all new doctors must swear to.

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1176 Words | 5 Pages

A New York court recently ruled physician assisted suicide as illegal, arguing that it is not a fundamental right of the patient. I agree with this ruling, and will argue that supporting physician-assisted suicide cannot be ethically justified and violates several

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443 Words | 2 Pages

Notably, “Physician-assisted suicide differs from euthanasia, which is defined as the act of assisting people with their death in order to end their suffering, but without the backing of a controlling legal authority.” (CNN par. 3) For this reason, some could make a case that assisted suicide is nothing more than a qualified physician helping a patient willingly end his life, no harm, no foul; however, it is rarely considered that all physicians take an oath that they will do all in their power to care for their patients and give them what they need to heal, not what they need to die. Should this oath be disregarded if the patient wishes to die?

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1286 Words | 6 Pages

People should be able to to live their life to the longest. Physician-assisted suicide is a controversial topic spreading throughout the United States due to the ethical issues surrounding the topic. Physician-assisted suicide is legal in a few states and other states have passed bills to make sure this does not happen. Even though some say that all have a right to die, physician-assisted suicide should not be legal because it would be too psychologically damaging to all involved. Having a right to die is what makes assisted suicide so controversial.

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1065 Words | 5 Pages

Both advocates for and against physician assisted suicide have realistic reasons behind their feelings and facts, but ethical issues will be present either way. In the states that physician assisted

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1379 Words | 6 Pages

While assisted suicide is not as controversial a topic as abortion or gun control, it is quite controversial nonetheless. The idea that a medically licensed doctor can help someone end their life, the exact opposite of their job description, is mind boggling. Many people feel as though this is wrong and religiously a sin, but others feel as though it is every person’s decision how they live and, in this case, how they end their lives. Those who are for physician-assisted suicide have probably had some sort of contact with it, whereas those who are so against it, probably have no reason to try to understand why someone may want to take their own life this way.

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1215 Words | 5 Pages

However, the sad truth is that nobody gets to choose how he or she dies. Or do they? In some states such as Oregon, Montana, and Washington physician-assisted suicide has been made legal, allowing people to choose death. This sounds very dark and wrong but the truth is that physician assisted suicide should be legal throughout the United States because people deserve the right to make choices for themselves in life, because some people would die an extremely painful death, and because some people have major disabilities that prevent them from really living.

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