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Healthcare Moral Paper

Categories: Philosophy

  • Words: 1378

Published: Sep 12, 2024

Physician-assisted suicide occurs when the patient is helped commit suicide by the physician upon being requested by the patient. Assisted suicide occurs when the patient wants to die, and the healthcare provider responds by assisting them in completing their request.

Therefore, this paper aims to explain the legal and ethical issues surrounding physician-assisted suicides and their implications on the manager's health services economics (Quill, 2018).

 

Legal and Ethical Issues

Several people have believed that criminalizing physician-assisted suicide should be done since it is viewed as murder though this is unconstitutional. Some states have started enacting laws that declare the practice of physician-assisted suicide legal. Some of the legal issues that arose from PAS were that when this practice has been legalized, it will pressure patients with terminal conditions and fear that their illness is emotionally, financially, and physically burdening their families. Besides, assisting patients in committing suicide is going against the two thousand years of medical ethics and practice (Jansen et al., 2019).

Ethically, the healthcare provider is expected to be the patient's healer, a provider of life, and not the person who takes away the patient's life. Even though a state may pass the physician- assisted suicide legalizing law, the healthcare provider may not believe in it since it goes against what they lean in medical school. Healthcare providers are taught not to cause suffering and pain to the patients, and by helping them end their life, some may believe this is not ethically right.

The healthcare provider has the option of not helping e client commit suicide. However, they may feel sorrow for the patient and the state of their suffering.

It is ethical for every person to be responsible for their own lives since it is fundamental for everyone. Physician-assisted suicide will only be conducted safely and ethically when physicians ensure that proper safeguards, measures, and consents are enforced (Summasy & Mueller, 2017).

Implication on Managers

The implication of physician-assisted suicide is not only causing legal and ethical issues but also affects health service managers. The repercussions affect the health managers deciding for those in a situation where they want to commit suicide, and the manager is unwilling to support them. As health service managers, one must advocate for other providers and the patient's wishes even if one does not believe in patient-assisted suicide. The health manager's work is to bring an opinion that is biased and ensure that the wishes of the patient are obeyed if the state laws have legalized the act (McClelland & Goligher, 2019).

Healthcare managers are the face of health organizations. The entire community looks up to them, seeking answers to why an action happened or failed to happen. This occurred commonly when the patient underwent physician-assisted suicide, but their family members were not supporting the idea. As a healthcare manager, one needs to remain educated and grounded and understand that their work setting involves patient emotions. However, this should not affect the manager's role. The manager is expected to support the patient both ethically and legally.

Implication on Health Economies

Previously people used to think that physician-assisted suicide helps the country with healthcare savings. When the breakdown of savings of physician-assisted suicide was laid down, it was reported that approximately 2.7 million American patients die every year, and these patients are likely to choose physician-assisted suicide. It is estimated that these patients' hospitalization cost in the last month of their life is $10 118. It is estimated that when physician- assisted suicide is legalized, it will save around $627. This figure is less than 0.07% of the country's expenditure on health. Therefore, choosing physician-assisted suicide will not have any significant impact on health economics (Largent et al., 2019).

References

 

Jansen, .L A., Wall, S., & Miller, F. G. (2019). Drawing the line on physician-assisted death. Journal of Medical Ethics; 45:190-197. http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/medethics-2018- 105003

Largent, E. A., Terrasse, M., Harkins, K., Sisti, D. A., Sankar, P., & Karlawish, J. (2019).

Attitudes Toward Physician-Assisted Death From Individuals Who Learn They Have an Alzheimer Disease Biomarker. JAMA Neurol. 76(7):864–866. doi:10.1001/jamaneurol.2019.0797

McClelland, W. & Goligher, E. C. (2019). Withholding or withdrawing life support versus physician-assisted death, Current Opinion in Anaesthesiology: Volume 32 - Issue 2 - p 184-189 doi: 10.1097/ACO.0000000000000686

Quill, T. (2018). Dutch practice of euthanasia and assisted suicide: a glimpse at the edges of the practice. Journal of Medical Ethics 2018; 44:297-298. http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/medethics-2018-104759

Summasy, L. S., & Mueller, P. S. (2017). Ethics and the Legalization of Physician-Assisted

Suicide: An American College of Physicians Position Paper. Annals of internal medicine.

https://doi.org/10.7326/M17-0938

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