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Legalizing Physician Assisted Suicide Argumentative Essay

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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 …show more content…

Legalizing physician assisted suicide can not only be a solution to the shortage of vital organs that are needed, but can also give terminally ill patients the opportunity to save another person’s life. According to a journal article written by Michael Cook, “Organ donation after euthanasia enables those who do not wish to remain alive to prolong the lives of those who do, (BioEdge). By giving patients who no longer have the will to live this option they are able to die knowing that they saved another person. Not only do they get this chance, but the organs recovered from them are more viable for transplants. This is because, with the preparation of death by physician assisted suicide, a doctor can save the healthy vital organs before they are left unviable. Doctors are able to save the lives of many other patients instead of spending time on terminal patients who no longer want to live in their

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Physician-assisted death is the practice in which a physician provides a mentally competent patient with the means to take his/her own life, usually in the form of prescribing death-dealing medications. It first became legal in the United States in Oregon in 1998. It is now legal in four other states: Washington, California, Montana, and Vermont. In order for one to exercise their right to die this way, the law states that the patient must be at least 18 years old, be mentally competent, be diagnosed with a terminal illness that will lead to death within six months, and must wait at least fifteen days before filling the death-dealing prescriptions. This controversial practice has raised the question of whether or not it is ethical for a physician

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Lastly, those who commit physician assisted suicide can save the lives of others. Pre-informed deaths help hospitals save the vital organs of the person willing to die and prepare for a successful transplant. Death is unpredictable, but many organs are

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Physician-Assisted Suicide: A Right to Murder? Doctors spend over eight years attending college, studying and practicing how humans work and how to save them. So why should it be right for physicians to help out their patients in killing themselves? If a person chooses to end their life, they completely loose the possibility of a medical miracle of being able to live through whatever condition they have.

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After researching both sides of the argument, it is clear that the benefits of physician-assisted suicide outweigh the disadvantages. The benefits of ending a patient’s pain and suffering, minimizing the emotional and financial effects on families, and preserving the right for patients to decide their own fate, supports the legalization of physician-assisted suicide.

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In this case, and many others worldwide, physician assisted suicide is morally permissible at all ages for anyone with a terminal illness with a prognosis of 6 months. This is supported by act based utilitarianism and the idea of maximizing pleasure and reducing pain and suffering on an individual circumstance. By allowing a terminal patient to die a less painful death, in control of the situation, and with dignity, the patient will have amplified

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Death is inevitable, it is something all living creatures must endure on this side of eternity. There is a multitude who will not be able to determine or choose when that time happens, life circumstances are usually out of the controlling grips of humanity. Despite that truth, as of 2015 there are five states in the U.S.A. where terminally ill persons eighteen or older with no more than six months to live are allowed to take their life with the assistance of a physician. California, Montana, Vermont, Washington, and Oregon, have all legalized the practice of physician assisted suicide (USA Today, PAS Dignity 2015). The act is generally committed by way of a prescribed lethal dose of medications intended to speed up the process of the patient 's

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Physician assisted suicide is when a physician provides the means required to commit suicide, including prescribing lethal amounts of harmful drugs to a patient. In the United States alone, there is great controversy about physician assisted suicide. The issue is whether physician assisted suicide is murder or an act of sympathy for the patient. The main point is that terminally ill patients should have a right to physician assisted suicide if it meets their needs and is done properly. Physician assisted suicide is an appropriate action for the terminally ill that want to end their life in peace before it ends at the hands of the terminal disease.

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Many people think that there are too many problems with physician assisted suicide. Physician assisted suicide is a procedure that allows physicians to prescribe their patients a lethal medication that they can inject themselves with in order to die on their own terms. There are specific requirements that the patients must meet in order to receive this medication. Physician assisted suicide is only for patients that have life threatening illnesses and do not have much time left to live. It is legal in numerous places around the world including certain places in the United States.

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Historically, as in ancient Greek and Roman times, euthanasia and physician assisted death (EAS), in all forms, were not only regularly practiced, they were quite common among all classes (Ian Dowbiggin N. pag.). Hippocrates developed The Hippocratic Oath at around 300 B.C. and included the passage that physicians should not perform EAS even when asked. It took until the Christian movement for this to become the preferred method for practicing medicine. Euthanasia and physician assisted death are becoming more accepted in modern times, once again.

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This practice of assisted suicide also helps end suffering. Normally, terminal illnesses and diseases can cause a lot of pain for the patient and for friends and family. The pain for patients allows the patient to know that death is going to come because as the pain increases, it is thought that death will follow soon after. Family and friends will also have to go through the pain of seeing a loved one suffer. If this practice was there then everyone can make arrangements ahead of time for the death and everyone will be ready for when it does

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What is your feeling about dying in the hands of another person on your request? You may not know but this happens frequently, many people who become terminally ill think this is the best solution without suffering. I am going to tell you why many people along with myself do not agree with this scenario. I believe people should not have the option on assisted suicides. One reason is it is murder.

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