Question

Mr. B. is a 66 year old married man with advanced cancer to his liver, lungs and brain. He has a history of seizures at home. He was admitted to a palliative care unit cognitively unresponsive. His wife states that her husband wished to die at home but she could no longer care for him. Mr. B's extended family arrived and wish to discuss end-of-life plan of care. The extended family request the wife to have a second opinion on the plan of care by a family physician friend. Discussions between the wife and extended family continue for two days and the wife agrees to a second opinion. Mr. B. remains unchanged in his cognitive state and begins to demonstrate renal shut down. Family request a meeting to change Mr. B's code status from Do-not-resuscitate to full code. From your readings and the videos preceding this, what are the ethical issues in this case? Take a sheet of paper or open up a Word document and jot or type the ethical issues you think are going on in this case.

Answer 1

Answer: The ethucal issue that is involved in this case as the patient wanted to end of life but the family took decision for full code from do not resuscitate. The wife also described that the patient wanted end of life at home. So, the ethic issue involved is the autonomy of the patient. Patient has right to choose life or end of life and he already had mentioned his wish end of life.