[Right_to_die] Doctors claim many who went to Dignitas could have lived on

[World right-to-die news list (nonprofit)]

The Guardian in London reported on 22 June 09:

Suicide clinic challenged over patients who could have lived 'for decades'

• Renewed calls for debate over assisted suicide
• GPs' leader 'horrified' by Dignitas revelations

Senior doctors [in the UK] will tomorow express concern over the number 
of Britons suffering from non fatal illnesses such as rheumatoid 
arthritis and kidney disease who have used the Swiss suicide service, 
Dignitas.

Their fears were raised after the Guardian obtained a list drawn up by 
Dignitas which reveals the medical conditions which have driven 114 
Britons to end their lives at the clinic.

The document shows that while many had terminal illnesses such as cancer 
and motor neurone disease, others had non-fatal conditions which doctors 
say some people can live with for decades.

It covers the medical history of all but one of the 115 Britons who have 
died with Dignitas's help since the first did so in 2002. It identifies 
22 conditions in all. Thirty-six of the 114 unnamed Britons had various 
forms of cancer, 27 had motor neurone disease and 17 had multiple sclerosis.

But two had Crohn's disease, an inflammatory bowel disease; two were 
tetraplegics; three had kidney disease, which can be usually treated by 
dialysis or a transplant; and one had rheumatoid arthritis – all 
conditions which doctors say are not terminal.

The details have prompted deep concern among senior doctors, calls for 
the NHS to provide much better end-of-life care and a renewed debate 
over demands for a new legal right of assisted death to render the 
growing British use of Dignitas unnecessary.

Professor Steve Field, chairman of the Royal College of General 
Practitioners, said: "I'm horrified by this list. While I appreciate 
that some patients with conditions like these experience great suffering 
and misery, I'm concerned because I know that many of the conditions 
outlined are conditions patients live with and can live with for many 
years and continue to have productive and meaningful lives."

While most of the conditions could contribute to a patient's death, 
equally people with many of them – such as Aids, cancer and tetraplegia 
– could, with the right treatment, lead fulfilling lives, added Field. 
NHS palliative care was too often "rather patchy", said Field, who was 
"worried" that not all the 114 patients may have been aware of 
treatments that could have prolonged their lives. Dr John Saunders, 
chair of the Royal College of Physicians' ethics committee, said: "The 
conditions are so varied that it suggests that Dignitas is not 
undertaking the adequate medical assessment [of patients seeking its 
help] that might be expected. The list does suggest that Dignitas is 
cavalier in arranging for people to end their lives."

Dr Tony Calland, chairman of the ethics committee at the British Medical 
Association, the doctors' union, said: "This list raises considerable 
concern. There are some conditions such as Crohn's disease and 
rheumatoid arthritis that, whilst extremely unpleasant, are eminently 
treatable and many of the symptoms can be relieved. To go off and commit 
suicide simply on the basis of these conditions would be premature and 
unreasonable."

Their fears were echoed by Edward Turner, whose mother Anne, a retired 
doctor who had the incurable degenerative condition supranuclear palsy, 
became a focus of the right to die debate when she killed herself at 
Dignitas in January 2006. "The principle should be that if somebody is 
terminally ill and has started the process of dying, it's not 
unreasonable for them to have an assisted death. When people have 
non-terminal conditions, that's more troubling", said Turner.

"I don't want to see assisted suicide legalised for people who are 
disabled but not dying because morally that's a different thing. With 
the right care and support someone with tetraplegia, for example, can 
find quality and meaning in life."

Research published last year in the Journal of Medical Ethics showed 
that 21.2% of all those of various nationalities ending their lives at 
Dignitas had a non-fatal illness. The suicide at Dignitas last September 
of Daniel James, 23, from Worcester who was left paralysed from the 
chest down in a rugby accident, sparked a debate about the morality of 
it assisting the non-terminally ill to die.

Sarah Wootton of Dignity in Dying, which campaigns for terminally ill, 
mentally competent adults to be able to end their lives, said: "This 
information is a wake-up call.

"We face three choices: we can ignore the problem, we can seek the 
prosecutions of those that accompany a loved one abroad to die, or we 
can safeguard the process.

"The only logical way forward is to clarify the law so that it clearly 
distinguishes between assisted suicide, which should be prevented, and 
assisted dying, which should be regulated."

Next week's annual conference of the BMA will debate calls to end the 
threat of imprisonment hanging over those who go with loved ones 
travelling abroad to commit suicide, and a right of assisted dying in 
the UK for the terminally ill.