As future doctors, we agree that our patients have total control over which form of treatment they will receive (regardless of our own recommendations), but what if the “treatment” they desire is a choice we didn’t present them with. How about something as drastic as death? Keep in mind… I’m not talking about DNRs here. I’m talking about a patient walking into the clinic and asking you to kill him/her.
Read more
According to a Kashmiri proverb, “until a physician has killed one or two he is not a physician.” At first, it seems kind of harsh to consider the aforementioned statement as even remote truth, but if you think about it, most professions can abide by something similar. Read more
Euthanasia is a well known practice in healthcare and research. Some consider it a feasible option which should always be available as a “last resort” but consider it an option nonetheless. Others frown upon its usage in the treatment of human patients but feel its acceptable in the laboratory setting. I think its also very similar to abortion in that its involves the voluntarily extermination of a life; however, at least euthanasia is performed after the consent of a patient. Fetuses can’t give their opinion before someone sentences them to death. In this post, I address euthanasia in a small context – a doctor treating a human patient.
From “Old Sparky” to the modern day lethal injection, the death penalty has been used for many years as a way of putting away convicts banished to death row. However, is it fair for our judicial system to deem a person worthy of suffering such a fate? What if the convict is genuinely sorry for his crime (ie, murder), are we, as compassionate human beings, allowed to give him a second chance?
If it was possible, would you want to know the exact date of your death? When attempting to answer this question, I realized how blissful a state of ignorance can be. The question exemplifies how mankind’s obsessive pursuit of wanting to know “everything” may have drawbacks.
