THE RIGHT TO DIE.

Otago Witness, Issue 3886, 4 September 1928, Page 34

THE RIGHT TO DIE.

INCURABLE CANCER. A DOCTOR’S DUTY, (From Our Own • Correspondent.) LONDON, July 27. What should be the attitude of a doctor towards hopeless cases of cancer? Should he prolong “ the act of dying ” ? This important question formed the substance of some observations by Sir Thomas Horder before the section of “ Medicine and Diagnosis ” at the Cancer Conference. “ In considering the treatment of cancer cathexia when the growth is Inoperable,” he said, “ it may be well first of all to decide what should be our attitude when faced with these distressing cases. “ Surely it should be to prolong lift) by all the means in our power consistent with not adding to the patient’s discomforts. Once we can get rid of tha stigma attaching to the disease —and thi§ will disappear in time—it will be as discreditable for the practitioner to neglect the treatment of cancer cathexia as it is for him to neglect the treatment of the tabetio, the chronic nephritic, or the chronic tuberculous patient. . It has been said that prolonging life in hopeless diseases is often ‘ prolonging the act of dying.’ When this is so, humanity rightly dictates that the doctor’s zeal is wholly misplaced. But as to this no universal rule can be laid down. This problem can only be solved by the exercise of great discretion, and the reflection that the patient is the central figure on th e stage. The patient’s life is his own and no one else’s prerogative, least of all that of his most sensitive friends. These often plead for the advent of death as a relief from their own participation in the struggle as much a s for his.”