Life and Death

[BeBMan]

One of your relatives is in heavy medical conditions, and so in intensive care, and you are the guy who - when push comes to shove - is supposed to decide about:


1. If needed, should the patient be kept alive by machines (breathing etc.)?

2. Forever, or for how long?

2. In case of critical situations, should the Docs do reanimation attempts, even if there's a prospect that the patient's condition may never improve so much that he can do without those machines?


I might be 'that guy' at some point this year. Family is involved, so I'm not alone, but legally I might be responsible....


What would you do?

[rah]

Ask them whenever possible, if not, do what you would want if you were in that situation. You're going to have to live with the decision so it's best if it's one they wanted or one you would choose yourself.

[Lorizael]

Don't just ask them. If at all possible, recommend they get a living will. Such decisions shouldn't be on your shoulders, unless you are extremely close to the person and know them and their wishes intimately.

Also, I'm sorry this is something you are or will be going through, BeBro.

[Proteus_MST]

If the patient can be kept alive forever (without aging and/or dying of a natural death), I wopuld decide to keep him on the machines ...
at one point in the near or far future there may be a cure forn the medicasl condition, you just have to wait long enough.

On a more serious note:
IMHO it depends a lot on his age and any permanent brain damages that may result from the medical condition.

If the person already is rather old I guess it is easier to justify stopping the machines, than iof it is a rather young person.#
Likewise it is easier to decide to stop the machines, if the likelyhood is high, that said person (if s/he ever wakes up) will have m,assive brain damages and will be a case for extreme nursing care
(actually, I for my person, if I were the patient, would definitely decide to have the machines stopped, if the latter case were a certainty)

[-Jrabbit]

Yes, get things defined in a living will if at all possible. Power of attorney/medical needs to be spelled out. I'm POA for my Mom (89) and, with each passing year, her wishes become more clear.

Talk directly to the person if at all possible. Once they are older and faced with potentially terminal conditions, most people have very definite ideas about things like machine-assisted life (vegetative state), DNR orders, forced feeding, and the like.

[Ming]

I agree with all... the most important thing is to talk the person and find out what their wishes are. Your decision will be much easier and with far less guilt if you are doing what they want.

[Berzerker]

sorry to hear that... try not to worry, god only knows how much time I wasted stressing over things that never happened. Make your decision when you see the bridge.

[Ben Kenobi]

Yeah, what Ming etc said. Get POA, get it spelled out. Write it all up so that your family member has everything put together now. It might sound macabre, but it's not. It's thoroughly practical. Get it done asap and it will make the future decisions much, much simpler. There will be zero arguments because everything was already written down.

As for myself, I've made it pretty clear in my will that they are not to take me off the respirator, etc or deny me food and water. It's a horrible way to go.

[rah]

Me, if it's that bad, please let me go. I wouldn't want to put the additional suffering and expense on my family. And I wouldn't want to be remembered that way.

[BeBMan]

Last will would be in general good. But unfortunately this is the dementia case in the family, my father.

A year ago or so he was still able to do most basic tasks, just forgot a lot. It has become way more serious in the last 6 months or so, now he is more or less like a child.

But some weeks ago he needed to go into hospital for an operation. After the 1st op things seemed to go forward again, but just recently he had to undergo a follow-up op and since then everything has gotten worse, both mentally and physically.

Of course we were aware/informed his conditions could change for the worse, but knowing it and actually seeing it on a regular basis is quite different...Sigh.

[ZEE]

I didn't feel like reading this thrade but I decided to poast anyway.

[BeBMan]

[Darsnan]

Last will would be in general good. But unfortunately this is the dementia case in the family, my father.

A year ago or so he was still able to do most basic tasks, just forgot a lot. It has become way more serious in the last 6 months or so, now he is more or less like a child.

I'm sorry you are having to go thru this BeBro. I'm a little bit further down the curve on this with my mother, as she has regressed to the point of an 8 month old. She is DNR and DNI, and has been in a dementia care facility for the past 4+ years. She is steadily losing weight now, as she is forgetting even the basics such as how to eat: the other day when I was having lunch with her I saw her repeatedly trying to scoop her fork with her spoon, as she wasn't comprehending that the fork was not food.

I am assuming you are going to start looking at care facilities for your father? If you are then I can give you advice based on my experiences - just let me know.

D

[pchang]

Rah has very good advice. If your father can no longer tell you what he wants, try to remember anything he might have said about the subject (even when referring to someone else) in the past.

[BeBMan]

Thanks guys.

Yes, Darsnan, we are actively looking care facilities these days, fortunately found a place that is good, from all info we could gather. It's planned to get him there when he gets out of hospital as he needs a lot of care (even when he's over his current medical condition) and my mother would not be able to handle that alone.

Sorry to hear about your mother. Best wishes for her, and for you.