Advance directive? i just received a c

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anna

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I just received a phone call that a woman I visit at a nursing care facility had passed away. Being I had just been there yesterday and she was happy, we took a walk in the garden, talked about our children etc…it made me upset to hear she passed. I asked what happened and what I was told deeply disturbed me. She could have been alright but her family had a do not resuscitate directive on her.

What gives someone the right to decide something like that?. To allow someone to just lay there and die, family says to do it and you oblige. Jesus help me for dealing with abortions and now hearing of a directive that ended a friends life is just to much. God please help us.
 
anna said:
I asked what happened and what I was told deeply disturbed me. She could have been alright but her family had a do not resuscitate directive on her.
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It’s not forbidden by the Church, and her family may have done it at her request. There may be circumstances you don’t know.
 
I am very sorry for your loss.

If there was a DNR, it was because that is what your friend very specifically directed. It requires paperwork, signatures, and notarization. It is something that isn’t taken lightly.

It is possible you don’t know all of the health issues your friend had. It is possible she knew that if she didn’t have the DNR, she may have survived the incident but her quality of life would have been horrible.

It isn’t against Church teaching to have a DNR in place. It is a wonderful thing for a person to make that decision for themselves, while they are able.
 
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First off, I am sorry to hear that the woman you visit has passed away. As a priest, I visit a number of people to bring them communion, and it’s always difficult to lose one of my visits–it’s still a little strange driving past the house of one of them who passed a few months ago. You and she are in my prayers.

Without more details, it is difficult to assess the morality of the situation, but DNR orders and certain kinds of advance directives are not always disallowed under Catholic moral teaching. And if she was still lucid enough to talk to you and take a walk and whatnot, then she would have had to have consented to signing such a thing anyway.

DNRs are indicated sometimes for certain diseases or for people of advanced age, wherein to resuscitate them would be extremely traumatic (@Pup7 can probably fill in more on the specific medical practice here), and likely result in the person suffering major injuries that result in severe pain and a strongly diminished quality of life for the remainder of their time. A person should not simply have a DNR just to have one, but with careful consultation with their doctors and next of kin, they may determine that it would do more harm than good to resuscitate them, and so if cardiac arrest came, it would be best to let nature run its course.

The key principle with end-of-life decision making is that there’s a moral difference between “to kill a person” and “to allow a person to die.” The former is always morally illicit. The latter, under some circumstances, may not be. Simply allowing nature to run its course isn’t necessarily wrong. Again, without further knowledge of the age, physical condition, and medical history of the woman you used to visit, it’s hard to assess the morality of the situation.

Edit: Check out this article from the National Catholic Bioethics Center on DNR orders, as well as this one on End-of-Life issues.

-Fr ACEGC
 
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There is nothing immoral about dying naturally. Nor is anyone obliged by Church teaching to undergo extraordinary or painful procedures such as resuscitation.

But for young, healthy people, a DNR is not usually a good choice. Rather, have a Healthcare Power of Attorney. That person can intervene according to what they know you might want and what the situation might be.

I was once part of the Code Team (as chaplain) for a Level One Trauma Center. Once I saw the torturous and somewhat brutal procedure which must be performed in an attempt to bring someone back, I understood why many prefer to have a DNR Status. In my experience, most could not be resuscitated. Some came back only to die again a few hours or days later. Indeed, the extra time it gave them was quite painful due to their illnesses and bruises and even cracked ribs from the Code Team saving them.

So, I certainly respect those who wish to spare themselves and others such suffering by simply accepting a natural death.
 
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We are morally obligated to pursue the “ordinary means” however, and as the ordinary means improve, we need to seek…well…the ordinary means available in our health care system.
 
Did something happen between the time you saw her and the next day?
 
Father, she was on dialysis she fell down and the fistula either moved, came out I don’t know. She called out, they came but did not help. She literally bled until it was over. I do not understand for she was awake ,Why is something like this acceptable
 
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I’m very sorry to hear about the situation, as I’ve said. Again, without knowing further details of her medical history, or what her family had in place, it’s difficult to assess the morality of the situation.
 
I was a hospice volunteer and my wife was a hospice nurse.

DNR’s are necessary for those who’ are terminally ill and resuscitating them will only prolong their suffering.

They are moral and necessary as family members and loved one’s will often react emotionally rather than rationally when a person is in their last moment.

Jim
 
The Center says there are cases where a DNR is appropriate. I’ll take their word for it over that of a random stranger who thinks they know everything about everything.
 
Edward_H said:
they want an easy answer…they want a sound bite. …or - in some cases - they want to feel better about some past decision they made with momma or daddy, or granny.
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Hogwash. Disagreeing with you means none of those things. Try leaving the omniscience to God for a change.
 
DNR’s can only be issued when a patient has six months or less of life because of a terminal illness.

They are made by the patient or the primary care person who was assigned by that patient.

If after six months they have not passed, they are removed from hospice and DNR’s have to be reissued.

When a DNR is not present, this is what happens.

A terminally ill person goes into crises and they begin to crash. A family member, dials 911 and the Ambulance with EMT’s arrive.

With no DNR, the EMT’s fight to revive the person and take them to the ER where they’re put through a battery of treatments to revive them, only to eventually send them back home and go through the entire dying process all over again

DNR’s are necessary for the patient and those who care for them in their final hours.

Jim
 
Thank you for this post. As someone who has lived through this scenario with a family member, I can tell you a DNR is the way to go. At least that is my opinion, base don what I know about it. It is taken so seriously, that if you don’t have notarized copy on hand when the EMT’s show up, it is the same as not having one at all.

We would be sunk without the care of hospice and the medical community who understand the importance of these things. Thanks, again, for describing via scenario why it can be so important.
 
We had a family member under hospice care, who became unconscious and was likely to die in matter of days (he did), I think a DNR was a moral necessity.
 
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