when i was in hospital i signed a DNR order, did they have to honor it? because my solicitor also has instructions if i ever fell ill again to make sure the DNR is seen and adhered to, so your telling me Fraggle that docotrs nurses dont have to honor them?
Since you use the word "solicitor" instead of "attorney," you're obviously not an American, so I can't say how it would work in your country. Over here, it's very difficult to enforce a DNR. You almost need to check the attitude of the hospitals that serve your neighborhood before you buy a house there. And you could still become ill at work and be taken to a different hospital.
because i know if i am ever to ill to look after myself and i cant do anything i would want to die peaceful and with dignity, i would want my partner to make sure the order was seen through to the last letter
I don't know how old you are. We're all hoping that the Baby Boomers will force a reform of the right-to-die issue, just as they've dictated the evolution of every other aspect of American culture since the hula hoop and rock'n'roll. Our members under forty might well grow old in an era when their own end-of-life wishes will be respected.
At this time, if you're in an institution for the elderly and infirm, and your health deteriorates to the point of irreversible suffering and indignity, and you have a living will and a partner or family member to enforce it, they will eventually succeed in letting you die in peace, but it probably won't happen as quickly as either of you hoped and expected.
The problem is for younger people, say my age in their 60s, who don't want to be resuscitated from a heart attack or accident trauma. Our country just doesn't have the procedures in place for the first responders to be informed of your wishes, and their focus is on saving your life rather than searching your body for tags or tattoos or listening to your wife scream, "No no, he doesn't want that!" By the time they rush you to a hospital and a doctor has revived you and you're awake but a quadriplegic or something like that, nobody is going to take the rather extreme measures necessary to force you to die, retroactively as it were.
If you had a heart attack and the ambulance crew saved you, I would think that would be ok. I mean, how would they know??
That's my point. In a retirement home where you've gone downhill slowly, it's one thing. But it's quite different in an emergency situation.
And no, it would not "be ok" with me. I've known a few people who had heart attacks in their 60s and were "saved." They all wished they were dead. Being 65 can be all right if you're in really good health, which means you've got a lot of aches and pains and a few body parts that don't quite work right and some of the adventures you put off a little too long are already out of reach, but still you can get something out of life. But to be 65 and have a body that went through the trauma of a heart attack means you're suddenly somewhere between being a creaky old geezer who can just barely get around, and being a genuine invalid. No thanks.
And perhaps worst of all, heart attacks used to be an almost merciful way to die. You were alive and then bingo you were gone. Now they're saving us from that so we get to have wretched, painful (and expensive!) prolonged deaths from horrible things like cancer. No thanks!
Oregon, anyone? Or Holland?
