Physicians' Needs for Aged Patients

In terms of onlyterfingered antiquated, a surrogate must(prenominal) make the decision well-nigh whether to terminate interposition. This decision should be based on tether criteria: 1) inability to relieve pain and suffering; 2) disproportionate payload of treatment; and 3) inability to restore or maintain attribute of life. Callahan sets forth similar criteria for determining morally appropriate misgiving for competent elderly.

Regarding the second question, Callahan maintains the patient's proper(a) to determine what level of checkup care is appropriate. Callahan con consorts that elderly patients do not learn the right to "vigorous life-extending treatment" when there is little hope of recovery. Patients must take into account their moral obligations to family, friends, and community. In case of future day incapacitation, patients can make their decisions known through power-of-attorney agreements or support wills. All too often, however, aesculapian professionals are afraid to celebrate a patient's wishes, which lessens the effectiveness of these directives.

In answer to the third question, Callahan believes that doctors tend to use technology excessively because of the difficulty of making a prognosis that a patient is dying. It is still possible to accurately assess a patient's chances of survival after he or she has undergone a complete diagnosis. In the absence of such a diagnosis, doctors "treat with vigor" using technology.

Callahan argues that more elderly would support limits on life-sustaining medical checkup treatment if not for the abuse, by physicians, of advanced technology. This abuse leads the elderly to two fears: fear of abandonment in a semipermanent nursing facility and fear of prolonged, painful extension of life. Callahan asserts that these fears have foundation in fact. Medical advancement in drugs, surgery, and treatment procedures are extending the lives of elderly someones who are brain dead, gravely demented, incompetent, or severely ill. It is doubtful that the quality of life for these patients is good. On the contrary, for some(prenominal) it is likely that they will never again experience homosexual emotion or individualal interaction.

In general, a commonsensible person should agree with Callahan's position on limiting life-sustaining treatment for the dying elderly. He makes it clear that such limitations would only apply to elderly persons who are in advanced st epochs of enfeeble illness. He would exempt, for instance, a person like the late rose wine Kennedy, who lived to be over a hundred years old, but was in reasonably good health. However, once a person suffered a series of serious health setbacks, the advanced age criterion would be taken into consideration.

Another objection to Callahan's presumption is the inequity of applying life span standards to the elderly alone. What about severely handicapped infants who have no hope of leading long-term, pregnant lives? Callahan believes that is justifiable to expend more health care resources on a sick child than on a person of advanced age. He rationalizes that preventing premature death is better than difficult to prolong life artificially.

Callahan uses in support of limiting medical treatment to those of advanced age is the opinions of the elderly themselves. He cites a 1985 Gallup Poll that indicates that 68 percent of those 65 years or older would support a law that made it possible for the elderly to withhold life-susta
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