SUICIDE, EUTHANASIA AND MEDICAL ADVANCE DIRECTIVE

Suicide, Euthanasia and Medical Advance Directive



Suicide, Euthanasia and Medical advance directive

Suicide

The taking one's own life or causing one's own death is suicide. It is despair that usually causes a person to commit suicide, but mental disorders like bipolar disorder, depression, alcoholism, drug abuse and schizophrenia are the main causes. Significant role is played by misfortune, pressure, relationship problems, or financial difficulties in pressuring a person in ending his or her life. According to the World Health Organization, suicide is the 13th cause leading death across the globe, estimating over million deaths every year. Ten to twenty million attempts are made to commit suicide every year globally resulting in non-fatal results. It is a fact that religion, life, and honor influence the views on suicide, as the Abrahamic religions believe in the sanctity of life; suicide is considered offensive towards God. This view considers suicide a serious crime, a view that is still shared across the western world (James, 2008).

Euthanasia

Euthanasia, the right to die, or medically assisted suicide is a contentious issue. It involves people who are in severe pain and have the minimal quality of life due to injury or illness. They can be terminally ill. Depending on the perception, the goal of self-sacrifice is not to kill one but to save another always, hence making it ethically acceptable. The term Assisted suicide customarily refers to actions involving a person, aiding another to end their own life. This may include providing the person with the means, including the equipment or drugs to end their life. Unlike euthanasia where life ends by the other person, assisted suicide involves only in assistance the individual to end their life, with no direct involvement of the second person.

The application of intentionally or willingly ending a life to eliminate suffering or pain is known as euthanasia. It is referred as the "termination of life by a doctor at the request of a patient" by the Lord of the select committee on Medical ethics in England and is defined as "a deliberate intervention undertaken with the express intention of ending a life, to relieve intractable suffering".

When the consent of the patient is involved in the conduct on euthanasia, it is considered as voluntary euthanasia. It is legal in countries like Luxembourg, Netherlands, and Belgium and throughout the United States. Closely resembling this is assisted suicide, where the patient ends his or her life with a physician's assistance. It is legal to Switzerland, and the United States' Washington, Montana and Oregon states. When euthanasia is exercised on a patient, whose consent is not available, it is considered as non-voluntary euthanasia. It is illegal across the globe, but in certain cases and circumstance including children, is endorsed according to the Groningen Protocol in the Netherlands (Emile, 1997).

Medical advance directive

The investigation of advance directive is a written or oral statement that is your choice for medical treatment known to your doctor before. The investigation of advance directive may also appoint someone to make these ...