Third of UK doctors admit to shortening life

Guardian:

Around a third of doctors say they have given drugs to terminally ill patients or withdrawn treatment, knowing or intending that it would shorten their life, research reveals.

A study of doctors in charge of the last hours of almost 3,000 people finds decisions almost always have to be made on whether to give drugs to relieve pain that could shorten life and whether to continue resuscitation and artificial feeding.

In 211 cases (7.4%), doctors say they gave drugs or stopped treatment to speed the patient's death. In 825 cases (28.9%), doctors made a decision on treatment that they knew would probably or certainly hasten death. One in 10 patients asked their doctor to help them die faster.

What doctors do varies according to their religious beliefs, according to Prof Clive Seale, of Queen Mary, University of London, who carried out the research. But, he said, there was no evidence of a "slippery slope": that deaths of the most vulnerable, such as very elderly women and those with dementia, are being hastened more than others. "People sometimes say if you legalise assisted dying, then very elderly people in care homes will be pushed towards death," Seale said. "But the paper is fairly reassuring on that."

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If I ever get sick in the UK, I hope I can get treatment from a doctor with religious beliefs.