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Pros And Cons Of Physician Assisted Suicide

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Should physician assisted suicide (PAS) be legal? This has been a debate. Many people may have not even heard about it or really given any thought. Per MedicineNet.com (2012) 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. I would approve for this to be legal. Only four states in the USA have legalized it, California, Oregon, Vermont and, Washington. These states allow patients to end their lives require that the patient be 18 years of age or older, a resident of the state, competent and capable of communicating their wishes, and diagnosed with a terminal illness that will lead to death within six months. Legalizing it across America would beneficial because, it allows the patient to end pain and suffering, relieves some stress from family and/or care takers, and allows them to stay home in comfort. …show more content…

Imagine dealing with the pain and symptoms that medication may not even help with. The pain and suffering in its self is scarier than death as to be believe death is painless. Why prolong this? Patients find it unfair that the state can intervene. I read an article on CNN.com of Brittany Maynard who became an advocate of PAS after being diagnosed with stage IV brain cancer. The cancer was aggressive and she endured a great deal of pain. Which in her case, pain was mainly physical, but she also talked about the emotional suffering. Days are now literally counted. Pain will be daily and is simply scary. Patients should have the option to decide when is

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Physician-assisted suicide is a serious and controversial topic discussed throughout society today. On the contrary to popular beliefs, physician-assisted suicide is morally wrong and should be ceased. But physician-assisted suicide continues to grow throughout America, with 68% of Americans in favor of legalizing physician-assisted suicide. Some cons of physician-assisted suicide include: violation of Hippocratic oath, religiously unjust, decreases the value of human life, and gives doctors too much power.

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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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849 Words | 4 Pages

Statistically speaking, PAS is not that common, meaning there is not a likely chance that this practice could become overly common. In 2014, there were merely 368 confirmed cases of Physician Assisted Suicide in the United States, all of which were terminally ill patients. (CNN). So any argument stating that the numbers could get out of hand and the reasoning could be shoddy would be shot down by the fact that the numbers have remained constant for nearly twenty-seven years since the introduction of the practice (CNN). Ethically, the right thing to do would be to end the suffering as an act of mercy directed at the patient.

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1448 Words | 6 Pages

Physician assisted suicide is the ending of a person’s life on his or her own terms. Despite moral stigmas that argue against this right, assisted suicide has already become legal in several states. In the states where this is legal, several criteria must be met to qualify for physician assisted suicide. When treatment and suffering is not prolonged, physician assisted suicide would help the family and friends emotionally and financially. Legalizing physician assisted suicide, would ease the hardships of everyone involved and would protect the dignity of the person while also lessening their suffering and pain.

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715 Words | 3 Pages

Should Physician Assisted Suicide Be Legal Everywhere To Terminally Ill Patients? The two articles I picked are based on assisted suicide and tell the pros and cons of assisted suicide, both side have very valid reasons but I believe that physician assisted suicide should be legal everywhere to terminally ill patients. Should terminally ill patients be able to have a doctor terminate their life? I believe that this should be available to terminally ill patients.

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End of Life Action Acts/, are Oregon (1994), Washington (2008), Montana (2009), Vermont (2013), California (2015), Colorado (2016), and Washington D.C. (2016). There are many regulations and rules that the patients have to participate and meet the criteria for to even be considered for assisted suicide. Even through all these hardships, the patients are still undergoing a terrible disease that, for all states (except Montana), has to be a determined death within 6 months. The patients only wish to for someone to alleviate them of the pain and suffering they going through.

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533 Words | 3 Pages

Should assisted suicides be allowed for terminally ill patients? In my perspective, I believe they should be allowed for a few different reasons. Many people worry that legalizing doctor assisted suicide is irrational and violates the life-saving tradition of medicine. However, physician-assisted suicide should be legalized because it offers terminally ill people an opportunity for a peaceful death by recognizing the inadequacies of current medical practice in their treatment. First off, how do you think a patient would feel if they have been in a hospital bed for many months suffering a battle they know they can’t defeat?

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1994 Words | 8 Pages

Physician-assisted suicide should be legal in every state

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443 Words | 2 Pages

When it comes to physician assisted suicide, no clear-cut answer is immediately exposed as to whether it should be allowed in today’s society. According to CNN, “Physician-assisted suicide is legal in five US states. It is an option given to individuals by state law in Oregon, Vermont, Washington and California.” (par. 1)

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577 Words | 3 Pages

In the United States 5 out of the 50 states have legalized physician assisted suicide (CNN). Legalizing PAS will be beneficial to the terminally ill and their families. It will also give the terminally ill a chance to die on their own. Religion and moral standards have stopped the legalization of Physician-Assisted Suicide, but legalizing Physician-Assisted Suicide would help the suffering end for the terminally ill, they would be able to make the choice on when and how their life ends, and PAS lowers healthcare costs for the patient.

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When Suicide Is the Best Option Physician-assisted suicide is the voluntary termination of one’s own life by administration of a lethal substance with direct, or indirect assistance of a physician. This year approximately 1,228,600 people are expected to be diagnosed with cancer. Of those diagnosed 564,800 are expected to die. Why should these people have to suffer in pain before they die? Fatally ill people should be able to have the right to decide to end their pain.

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1224 Words | 5 Pages

It has been in the air for a while whether PAS should be legalized or left illegal. When taking one side or the other people most often consider the costs, dangers, and feelings of other parts of PAS, this includes the patient. These factors play a big role, but is assisted suicide really humane? In deciding the way this country as a whole is going to go, is killing the terminally ill, or medically disabled patients, the way we should value human life? These are just some of the many flaws in PAS.

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552 Words | 3 Pages

All human begins have the instinct of self-preservation and only people who have been driven to despair because of their illness, can ask for death and that is their right. Everyone’s pain tolerance is different and who are we to deny the request of a suffering human being and not relieve them from their excruciating pain. “Euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide will shorten the period of pre-mortem suffering and eliminate fear about how and when death will occur. The patient will have a measure of control over the process of dying” (Singer and Siegler). Euthanasia allows patients to not fear death and gain control over their

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1129 Words | 5 Pages

Euthanasia and PAS should be a legal option for terminally-ill citizens of the United States. Attempting to prolong the life of these patients can do more harm than

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