Case 10 D
In this case we are introduce to a 38-year-old patient who suffer a car accident around eight years ago. During the car accident he suffer an aorta rupture that left him in a persistent vegetative state (PVS). Over the past five years Bob has been taken care for at a Catholic nursing home were he receives tube feeding, fluids and treatments for complications of his state. Recently his wife Lola and Bob’s parents have decided that they would want to discontinue Bobs feeding tube. The physician agree that it was acceptable to remove the feeding tube, but since it was a Catholic nursing home that maybe they would have to remove it somewhere else. The problem that we are presented with in this case study is whether it is ethically correct to remove the feeding tube of someone who is in a persistent vegetative state and whether this should be
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According to our textbook the Pope stated, “ patients in a PVS have an inherent dignity that is not lost because of their illness; that caregivers, families, and society have a duty to care for and protect these patients…. that appropriate rehabilitative services should be provided to these patients because their condition is not necessarily hopeless… that we can never remove treatment from these patients with the intention of killing them, as to do so would be a form of euthanasia.” When it comes to making decisions of whether it’s morally correct to decide to end the life of a love one is a difficult situation to be place in. However, in this case Bob is not brain death and therefore he is not legally death. If the family were to remove the feeding tube, this is ethically wrong because by removing the feeding tube form Bob, they will be starving him to death. Starving him to death is like murdering someone slowly and not only is this unethical, but it is