New report finds half of dying Britons are not dying well At a pivotal time for end of life care in Britain the need for advance care planning is reinforced Divided in Dying, a new report from charity Compassion in Dying, finds that almost half of those who have lost someone close to them through a short or long illness, feel their loved one died badly (45%). In cases where the dying person had recorded their end of life wishes, relatives and friends are more likely to report that they had a good death (58%). Alongside recording end of life wishes (19%), better communication between the doctor and their loved one (39%), co-ordination of care (33%) and being able to die in a place of their choice (31%) were also identified as key aspects which could have improved the situation for the person who died in a bad way. Compassion in Dying surveyed over 2400 British adults who were asked to recall the experience of the last relative or close friend who died.
Lord Falconer's Assisted Dying Bill [HL Bill 24] is the fourth of its kind to come before the House of Lords in the last ten years. None of its predecessors has made progress and the last one (Lord Joffe's Assisted Dying for the Terminally Ill Bill) was rejected in May 2006. This latest bill is little different from Lord Joffe's - it seeks to license doctors to supply lethal drugs to terminally ill patients to enable them to end their lives. The bill contains no safeguards, beyond stating eligibility criteria, to govern the assessment of requests for assisted suicide. It relegates important questions such as how mental capacity and clear and settled intent are to be established to codes of practice to be drawn up after an assisted suicide law has been approved by Parliament. This is wholly inadequate for a bill, such as this, with life-or-death consequences. Parliament cannot responsibly be asked to approve such a radical piece of legislation without seeing the nature of the safegua...
National clinical guidelines on the care of people in a vegetative or minimally conscious state, following severe brain injury These long-awaited guidelines will be a major contribution to clinical and ethical standards of care for this group of patients, not only in the UK but internationally. For England and Wales, they provide much needed clarity on legal decision-making. You can buy a print copy of the guidelines (130 pp, £15) from our online shop, or download a free PDF below. The guidelines were developed by a panel of experts in the field, who have organised complicated and wide-ranging information into six coherent sections: 1 Defining criteria and terminology 2 Assessment, diagnosis and monitoring 3 Acute to longer-term management 4 Ethical and medico-legal issues 5 End-of-life issues 6 Service organisation and commissioning Each section is followed by a set of clear recommendations.