Decisions to abate life-sustaining treatment for nonautonomous patients. Ethical standards and legal liability for physicians after Cruzan
- PMID: 2402044
Decisions to abate life-sustaining treatment for nonautonomous patients. Ethical standards and legal liability for physicians after Cruzan
Abstract
KIE: The lives of hopelessly ill patients often are prolonged because physicians are uncertain of the legal consequences of discontinuing life-sustaining treatment, particularly when a patient lacks decision making capacity. Physician uncertainty may increase in the light of the U.S. Supreme Court's Cruzan decision, which upheld Missouri's refusal to support a family's request to discontinue tube feeding a patient in a persistent vegetative state. Weir, an ethicist, and Gostin, an attorney, examine the body of case law through Cruzan related to the issue of abating life-sustaining treatment for nonautonomous patients, including decisions on the right to refuse treatment, the role of surrogate decision makers, types of treatment that may be abated, and the threat of legal liability. They conclude that physicians need not fear the legal consequences of discontinuing life-sustaining treatment if an appropriate decision making process has been followed.
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