Death by voluntary dehydration--what the caregivers say

Abstract

Researcher Linda Ganzini, M.D., says she was "stunned" after tallying the questionnaire results reported in this issue of the Journal (pages 359-365): Among the hospice nurses in Oregon who were surveyed, nearly twice as many had cared for patients who chose voluntary refusal of food and fluids to hasten death as had cared for patients who chose physician-assisted suicide. Reagan recalls an elderly patient who, having been debilitated for years by severe arthritis pain, sought but did not qualify for physician-assisted suicide under Oregon's Death with Dignity Act.