“In the end of February, it was discovered I had kidney cancer,” said hospice care worker Dorothy Haden, who has stage four cancer.

“I tried to live my life with dignity, and I do want to end my life with dignity,” said former lawmaker Earnest Juggie Heen, who has liver and pancreatic cancer.

Both said they want to choose how and when they end their lives.

“It’s our position that aid in dying is legal and it can be incorporated into medical practice legitimately here in Hawaii,” said Barbara Coombs Lee, who is the president of Compassion & Choices, a national nonprofit organization that supports aid in dying. She returned to Hawaii in early November, one year after a small group of Hawaii doctors first prescribed life-ending medication to a terminally ill patient.

“Hawaii has a constellation of laws that have never really criminalized aid in dying,” she said.

She said in the past year, 31 people have inquired about aid in dying, seven qualified to receive medication, and four were actually prescribed it, but she said all four died of natural causes before taking that prescription.

“People just want the comfort. They just want peace of mind,” she told KITV4 reporter Lara Yamada.

What opponents call assisted suicide is legal in three states: Oregon, Washington and Montana. Massachusetts included it on the ballot in 2012, but voters shot it down. Hawaii’s attorney general said he considers it manslaughter, but has yet to prosecute any physicians in the state.

“There has never been in the history of the United States a physician who has been successfully prosecuted for providing a terminally ill, mentally competent person with medication that they could take to die,” said Coombs Lee.

Affirmation, she says, that this movement will continue to grow.

“At some point I may have to make that choice,” said Haden.

Compassion & Choices Hawaii, a nonprofit organization working to improve care and expand choice at the end of life, received 31 local inquiries in its first year of service.

The figure comes from an annual report released by the Physician Advisory Council for Aid in Dying, or PACAID, a group of local doctors that collaborates with Compassion & Choices Hawaii and can prescribe life-ending medication if necessary.

PACAID has a rigorous eligibility process that applicants must go through, and of those 31 inquiries only seven qualified to consult with a PACAID doctor.

Of the seven, four received a prescription for medication “which they could ingest to end their life and suffering in peace and dignity, at the time of their choosing,” according to a Compassion & Choices press release.

As of Thursday, two of the four patients died from natural causes and none had taken the medication.

Our hearts go out to Karen Okada, who lies dying while her family and the
lawyers argue over her body.

This 95-year-old woman expressed in her 1998 written “living will”
(advance directive) not to have her dying “artificially prolonged.”
We have all heard how important it is to create an advance directive if we
hope to make the journey to death in a manner consistent with our values.
Mrs. Okada’s experience makes clear this is not as easy as filling out a form
and filing it away.

Last month, Mrs. Okada suffered the latest in a series of medical crises that
began in December. Her doctors at The Queen’s Medical Center determined
she was beyond recovery and recommended removing her feeding tube.
A complicating factor is present, though. At the same time she documented
her wishes, Mrs. Okada also completed another equally important advanceplanning
document: She appointed her brother as her health care proxy to
make medical decisions if unable to do so herself. He insists the feeding tube
stay in place.

We cannot know what is in her mind now. Is this the kind of condition she
wanted to continue in? How can you be sure your wishes will be followed?
Compassion & Choices (www.CompassionAndChoices.org) educates,
supports and advocates on a broad range of end-of-life issues. Our
counselors help thousands of people each year find peaceful deaths that
honor the values of a lifetime. They advise that you must not only document
your wishes, but also discuss them with your health care proxy and satisfy
yourself that he or she is the right person to honor them when the time
comes. Make sure your proxy understands your desires, and is able and
willing to see your wishes carried out. Sometimes it can be hard to convince
a loved one that, under certain conditions, allowing you to die will be the
best way to care for you and express love.

Before asking someone to be your proxy, ask yourself, “Are they assertive?
Are their values aligned with mine? Will they respect my choice even if
grief or pressure from others makes it hard to do so?”

Review and discuss these documents regularly. Your family should know
what your wishes are and why. Your doctor also should know where you
stand, and you should feel comfortable that he or she will advocate
respecting your wishes. It appears that The Queen’s Medical Center
physicians acted to respect Mrs. Okada’s directive. Unfortunately, her proxy
demands treatment in conflict with her expressed wishes, forcing the dispute
into court.

Compassion & Choices supports an individual’s decision on how to
approach dying. We believe patients within six months of death are entitled
to make their own end-of-life choices. For mentally capable patients, this
includes the choice to request medication to assure the possibility of a
peaceful death.

We offer guidance to individuals facing a terminal illness or just planning
ahead, and we work for public policies that support individual choice and a
full range of options at the end of life.

By Chad Blair 04/03/2012

In his 35 years as an oncologist, Dr. Charles Miller has seen a lot of patients with breast, prostate, colon, lung or ovarian cancer.

For those at the end of their lives, most are either in lots of pain or experiencing a poor quality of life.

“They say to you, ‘Doc, I want to get this over with. I just want to finish this,’” said Miller. “And it is a decision between the patient and the physician.”

Dr. Charles Miller

Typically, a patient will be in a hospice and a nurse will call the doctor to get permission to increase a morphine dose so that the patient will not wake up.

“But that does not give the patient control or choice,” said Miller. “I know that there were patients who wanted to have more control — who wanted to say, ‘Doctor, I want to do this.’”

The problem has been uncertainty among many doctors about how to provide that control, and whether there is a legal risk.

To help doctors, Miller has helped form a new group called the Physician Advisory Council for Aid in Dying, or PACAID. The four-member council will help doctors “empower” their terminally ill patients, including prescribing lethal barbiturates.

PACAID is likely to have an impact locally on the socio-political debate over aid in dying.

So-called Death With Dignity legislation has met with strong opposition from churches, some social-service agencies and end-of-life care providers at the Hawaii Legislature, and lawmakers have repeatedly heeded their concerns.

But PACAID’s establishment also comes in the wake of a January survey by QMark Research of Hawaii that found 76 percent of doctors agree that “people in the final stages of a terminal disease should have the right and the choice to bring about their peaceful death.”

Equally important, say supporters of the aid-in-dying movement, is a growing belief that the courts and state and federal governments do not have to be involved.

Groups like Compassion & Choices, which has a local chapter, argue that there are already laws on the books that favor autonomy when it comes to end-of-life decisions.

“The bottom line, in overhwhelming numbers, people are saying this is not the government’s business, that this is between a patient and their doctors,” said Dr. Robert Nathanson, another member of PACAID. “So, if that’s the case, doctors need to have some kind of guideline. And we felt that PACAID was needed.”

Rigorous Process

PACAID is described as first-of-its-kind in the nation, and physicians in Montana are in the process of starting a similar council.

Beside Miller and Nathanson, PACAID’s other founding member was Dr. Max Botticelli, who passed away last month.

Two other Hawaii MDs — Clifton S. Otto and John Samuel Spangler — are also council members. PACAID will also lead and support a larger a network of supportive physicians.

While PACAID doctors could prescribe life-ending medication, that is a decision that must go through a rigorous process. PACAID members have adopted best-practice guidelines from states like Oregon and Washington where aid-in-dying laws exist. An Aid-in-Dying Practice in Hawaii—Physician Guide and pro-bono legal counsel will also be provided.

“We see the council as an advisory and consultative source, and one of the guidelines is that we would never write any prescription without collaboration and getting all that medical information,” said Miller. “We would be willing to write a prescription, but ideally it would be best if the primary doctor writes it.”

Miller added, “We do understand there are physicians who are not comfortable with this for what ever reason. So we see us as helping the patient, to give support to them for their choice for end-of-life care.”

Compassion & Choices Hawaii — a 501(c)(3) — will provide staffing to support administrative needs of PACAID physicians, who are volunteers and do not receive compensation.

How PACAID and its mission will be received is unclear.

While PACAID and Compassion & Choices believe Hawaii law allows doctors to advise patients on ending their lives, Hawaii Attorney General David Louie issued an opinion in December stating that one of those laws — a 1909 statute regarding Hansen’s disease patients — does not make doctor-assisted suicide legal.

The opinion came at the request of state Sen. Josh Green, an MD, who has held hearings on Death With Diginity.

One critic of Death With Dignity, Allen Cardines Jr., executive director of the Hawaii Family Forum, was alarmed to hear of PACAID’s formation.

“This is the first I’ve heard of it, but, top of mind, I would be very concerned about a bunch of doctors going around providing aid in dying,” he said. “I think doctors should provide aid in living, not aid in dying.”

Not Expecting Flood of Applicants

QMark Research of Hawaii conducted phone and fax interviews from Jan. 5-23 by sampling from MD listings in each county.

The specialities were cardiovascular disease, family and general practice, geriatrics, immunology, infectious disease, internal medicine, nephrology, oncology, hematology and pulmonology.

The sample size was small — just 43 doctors completed the interviews, yielding a margin of error of plus 15 percentage points. But three out of four agreed that people in the final stages of a terminal disease “should have the right to bring about their peaceful death and the decision to receive medication to help is a personal decision between patient and doctor.”

And nearly nine in 10 doctors agreed end-of-life decisions “should be an individual decision and the medical community, rather than government, should establish practice guidelines to prevent abuse.”

Just 57 percent of doctors, however, favored allowing their terminally ill patients the choice to request and receive medication from their doctor “to bring about a peaceful death.”

PACAID’s Miller and Nathanson say they are not worried about legal repercussions.

They also do not expect to be flooded with requests for lethal doses. They base that on the experience of Oregon, which, in the 14 years since it passed a Death With Dignity law, saw only 525 patients actually use the medication.

“All the concerns are way overblown,” said Miller.

“There may be a few requests, but I am willing to bet that a majority of them won’t quite understand what the regulations are,” said Nathanson, who adds that he has turned down requests from friends. “The only reason they wanted the pills is because they are elderly, but they are perfectly healthy. I told them, ‘You don’t qualify and I hope you never do.’”

Nathanson, who rejects the argument that prescribing lethal medication is enabling suicide — “Terminal people don’t have a choice, they are going to die from disease” — said the drugs may actually produce an unexpected outcome.

“One of the paradoxes is that when a patient gets the medicine, they frequently will live longer than expected,” he said. “The hospice nurse will tell the family that their mother who wasn’t eating hardly at all or watching TV or reading or interacting is now eating like a horse and now doing those things. It’s because the person no longer has that toxic anxiety. They know that they are empowered if things become intolerable. And the definition of that is whatever the patient says is intolerable.”

Read the story at its original location: Honolulu Civil Beat

Physicians Form Advisory Council to Take the Lead

HONOLULU – Leading Hawai’i physicians today announced formation of the Physician Advisory Council for Aid in Dying (PACAID) and released survey results showing overwhelming support by Hawai’i doctors to incorporate the practice into end-of-life care. A January survey by QMark Research of Hawai’i found 76% of doctors agree people in the final stages of a terminal disease should have the right and the choice to bring about their peaceful death.

The PACAID members will adopt best-practice guidelines for aid in dying, advocate supportive policies at medical organizations, and consult with patients and their physicians. They will provide peace of mind to terminally ill, mentally competent adults by prescribing life-ending medication that patients may self-administer if suffering becomes unbearable.

Charles F. Miller, MD, FACP; Robert “Nate” Nathanson, MD; and the late Max Botticelli, MD, founded PACAID with the primary goal of helping physicians empower their terminally ill patients. By having personal control of their end-of-life options patients have the ability to achieve peace of mind, reduce suffering and have a higher level of satisfaction at the end of life. Clifton S. Otto, MD, and John Samuel Spangler, MD, joined PACAID, bringing the core group of physicians to five before Dr Botticelli’s untimely death.

The physician-members of PACAID will develop, lead and support a larger Physician Coalition for Aid in Dying, a network of supportive physicians. “Nearly nine in ten doctors agree the medical community – not government – should establish practice guidelines to prevent abuse,” said Hawai’i pollster Barbara Ankersmit, president of QMark Research. Fifty-seven percent of doctors agreed specifically they favor allowing their terminally ill patients the choice to request and receive aid in dying.

“Aid in dying will be gradually implemented and incorporated in end-of-life care in Hawai’i,” said Dr. Miller. “Dying patients will talk to their doctors, doctors will respond, hospice will work well with information we have provided, and aid in dying will be available along with, not instead of, hospice care.”

PACAID members will provide information, guidance and emotional support to hospice workers in cooperation with Compassion & Choices Hawai’i End-of-Life Consultation (EOLC) program. EOLC uses the power of choice and comfort to restore hope to individuals and their loved ones at the end of life. Individuals seeking information about end-of-life decisions can access Compassion & Choices Hawai’i’s End-of-Life Consultation service by calling 1-800-247-7421.

“Most medical care is governed by professional scope of practice standards,” said Dr. Nathanson, a founder of Hospice Hawai’i. “Medical practice standards routinely govern other practices that may advance the time of death, such as withdrawal of life-sustaining treatment, voluntarily stopping eating and drinking, and palliative sedation.”

In addition to leading the development of practice standards and building the coalition of supportive physicians, PACAID will advise physicians who receive aid-in-dying requests from patients and shepherd affirmative policy through local medical organizations. Members of PACAID with current licenses and prescribing privileges for controlled substances can serve a consulting role to patients and their doctors, and write a prescription for life-ending medication if the primary physician declines to do so for personal or moral reasons.

Last October, experts on Hawai’i law, medicine, elder care and policy-making for end-of-life issues concluded Hawai’i physicians may provide aid in dying, subject to professional best-practice standards. Based on the experience of professionals in other states, the physicians of PACAID aim to lend their expertise and leadership in developing those standards. Dr. Miller served for 30 years in the U.S. Army Medical Department, was chief consultant to the Surgeon General and spent nine years as chief of hematology-oncology at Kaiser Medical Center, Honolulu. Dr. Nathanson co-founded Hospice Hawai’i in 1979 and served in general practice for 37 years. Dr. Botticelli, one of the founders of PACAID before his unexpected death earlier this month, joined the University of Hawaii’s John A. Burns School of Medicine in 1971 and became chair of the Department of Internal Medicine in 1992. He also served as director, from 1986 to 1994, of the Queen Emma Clinic, operated by The Queen’s Medical Center in collaboration with the College of Health Sciences of the University of Hawai’i.

To interview Dr. Miller or Dr. Nathanson, please contact Steve Hopcraft or Scott Foster at the below phone or e-mail.

Scott Foster, 808/988-0555; fosters005@Hawaii.rr.com;
Steve Hopcraft, 916/457-5546; steve@hopcraft.com

Physician Advisory Council for Aid in Dying • 111 Hekili Street, Suite A410 • Kailua, HI 96734 • p 800.247.7421

]]> http://www.compassionandchoices.org/2012/04/03/3-of-4-hawaii-doctors-want-aid-in-dying-as-a-medical-practice/feed/ 0