Life Support Ethical Dilemmas
The Ethical Dilemma of a Patient’s Right to Die Is it wrong to discontinue a ventilator even at the patient’s request, with the expectation that the patient will die? Health care providers encounter ethical dilemmas such as this one on a daily basis in hospital and long term care settings. Choosing to withdraw life support poses one of the most prominent dilemmas in bioethics. Health care clinicians, which includes physicians, advance practice nurses and registered nurses, must utilize moral action guidelines in the midst of the emotion and confusion that such decisions create. Several ethical principles and theories are available to health care providers, but they leave much room for interpretation due to the variability of each clinical
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For nearly a decade or more, withholding life support is acceptable and justified by the principle of autonomy. Patients are encouraged to have a living will or an informed health care power of attorney so these difficult decisions are already made before the necessity arises. However, in the face of death and withdrawing what could be deemed a life saving measure, moral battles ensue (Gedge, Giacomini & Cook, 2007). Both physicians and nurses are not willing to accept defeat and have diligently battled to keep them alive and formed bonds with these patients in the process. Just as it is difficult for the families to let go, it is difficult for the practitioners caring for that …show more content…
Under the principle of autonomy those wishes must be respected. However, these clinicians ethically and morally insisted on doing the right thing, for they took an oath “to help and do no harm” (Epidemics, 1780). Consequently, they empowered the patient by providing informed consent on the benefits and consequences of withdrawal of life support. In the case of the minister, who was not a candidate to go home due to his unstable condition, the clinicians took a holistic approach to the patients care. They sought clarity on the mental and spiritual capacity of the patient, so they discussed all of these factors in an ethical consult with clinicians, family and the patient to ensure that he was not depressed and that he was spiritually and mentally competent to make this
For nearly a decade or more, withholding life support is acceptable and justified by the principle of autonomy. Patients are encouraged to have a living will or an informed health care power of attorney so these difficult decisions are already made before the necessity arises. However, in the face of death and withdrawing what could be deemed a life saving measure, moral battles ensue (Gedge, Giacomini & Cook, 2007). Both physicians and nurses are not willing to accept defeat and have diligently battled to keep them alive and formed bonds with these patients in the process. Just as it is difficult for the families to let go, it is difficult for the practitioners caring for that …show more content…
Under the principle of autonomy those wishes must be respected. However, these clinicians ethically and morally insisted on doing the right thing, for they took an oath “to help and do no harm” (Epidemics, 1780). Consequently, they empowered the patient by providing informed consent on the benefits and consequences of withdrawal of life support. In the case of the minister, who was not a candidate to go home due to his unstable condition, the clinicians took a holistic approach to the patients care. They sought clarity on the mental and spiritual capacity of the patient, so they discussed all of these factors in an ethical consult with clinicians, family and the patient to ensure that he was not depressed and that he was spiritually and mentally competent to make this