Description
Book SynopsisThoughtful and persuasive, this book urges the medical profession to improve palliative care and develop a more humane response to the complex issues facing those who are terminally ill.
Trade ReviewThe writing is of uniformly high quality, and the book achieves stylistic consistency while still reflecting an individual voice in each chapter. The book is sorely needed. -- Jeffrey M. Lyness New England Journal of Medicine The methods of palliative care, or comfort care, have in the past few decades reached a level of effectiveness such that suffering thought at first to be intractable can almost always be relieved. And this is the ultimate message of this vastly important book that now makes its timely appearance. -- Sherwin B. Nuland, M.D. New Republic A major contribution to our understanding of the practice, theory, and limitations of assisted suicide and euthanasia in seriously ill patients. The book is superbly written and intellectually challenging. I am convinced that it will become standard reading for all-whether advocates or opponents of assisted suicide-who want to think more deeply and learn more about what we need to do to improve end-of-life care. The Lancet The book is timely and important in the life and death debate that is of personal relevance to us all. Review of Disability Studies 2004 This excellent book will be a valuable resource for anybody interested in the delivery of better end-of-life care, whether they are clinicians, ethicists, or health care policymakerrs. International Association for Hospice and Palliative Care Foley, Hendin, and their contributors have produced a truly outstanding resource. Cambridge Law Journal 2003 Brings together some well known and respected players in the debate, whose contributions lend considerable weight to the case... A thought-provoking and comprehensive look at the case against assisted suicide. Bulletin of Medical Ethics 2005 Provides a comprehensive, persuasively argued case against assisted suicide. -- Tony O'Brien Metapsychology 2006
Table of ContentsPreface
Acknowledgements
List of Contributors
Introduction: A Medical, Ethical, Legal, and Psychosocial Perspective
Part I: Autonomy, Compassion, and Rational Suicide
Chapter 1. "I Will Give No Deadly Drug": Why Doctors Must Not Kill
Chapter 2. Compassion Is Not Enough
Chapter 3. Reason, Self-determination, and Physician-Assisted Suicide
Chapter 4. The Rise and Fall of the "Right" to Assisted Suicide
Part II: Practice Versus Theory
Chapter 5. The Dutch Experience
Chapter 6. Palliative Care and Euthanasia in the Netherlands: Observations of a Dutch Physician
Chapter 7. The Oregon Experiment
Chapter 8. Oregon's Culture of Silence
Chapter 9. Deadly Days in Darwin
Part III: Reason To Be Concerned
Chapter 10. Not Dead Yet
Chapter 11. Vulnerable People: Practical Rejoinders to Claims in Favor of Assisted Suicide
Chapter 12. Depression and the Will to Live in the Psychological Landscape of Terminally Ill Patients
Part IV: A Better Way
Chapter 13. A Hospice Perspective
Chapter 14. Compassionate Care, Not Assisted Suicide
Conclusion: Changing the Culture
Notes
Index
