Extraordinary Means of Life Support. medical procedures that offer little hope of benefits or which cause undue or excessive burdens to the patient and family (merely delay death temporarily but offer no real hope of reversing the dying process) extraordinary.
What is extraordinary life support?
"Extraordinary life-sustaining treatment is defined as any medical procedure or measure which, when administered to a terminally ill patient, will only prolong the process of dying when death is imminent, but excludes palliative care.
What are examples of extraordinary measures?
Examples of extraordinary measures are ventilators to take over natural breathing or cardiopulmonary resuscitation to keep the heart beating.
What is the principle of extraordinary means?
• Extraordinary means = “all medicines, treatments, and. operations, which cannot be obtained or used without. excessive expense, pain, or other inconvenience, or which, if. used, would not offer a reasonable hope of benefit” (Kelly. 1957 p.
What is the difference between ordinary and extraordinary means of medical care?
In assessing when there is a duty to preserve life, the Church distinguishes between ordinary and extraordinary means. [1] Ordinary means must be taken to preserve life, and extraordinary means can be morally refused.
What does extraordinary mean in medical terms?
Extraordinary measures are those that are based on medication or treatment which cannot be applied without incurring severe pain, costs or other inconveniences.
Is CPR an extraordinary measure?
In a hospital setting, when a patient's heart stops, extraordinary measures are used to restart their heart. Treatments often include the use of CPR, electrical shocks to the heart, injectable medications and often, a ventilator.
Is a ventilator considered extraordinary means?
On the other hand, if an otherwise healthy patient comes into the hospital with an abscess that requires surgery and the use of a ventilator, the ventilator — which can be costly and burdensome — is not extraordinary because the benefits outweigh the burdens.
What is principle of ordinary and extraordinary means?
Thus the doctrine of ordinary and extraordinary means. states, in essence, that the good of saving life is morally obligatory. only if its pursuit is not excessively burdensome or disproportionate. in relation to the expected benefits.
What makes extraordinary treatment extraordinary?
Extraordinary treatment is the medical treatment that cannot be used or obtained without excessive expense, pain or other burden or that does not offer a reasonable hope of benefit6.
Can Catholics turn off life support?
Roman Catholic perspective: The Catholic church supports decisions to stop or not start life support treatment if treatment would be futile or overly burdensome. In these situations life support treatment is sometimes referred to as 'extraordinary'.
Does the Catholic Church allow removal of life support?
With respect to other kinds of life support, such as ventilators, the basic Catholic principle is that "a person may forgo extraordinary or disproportionate means of preserving life." It is important to note that this assessment -- of what is extraordinary or disproportionate -- is the patient's prerogative.
What is the difference between ordinary and extraordinary care quizlet?
what is the difference between ordinary and extraordinary care? ordinary care is what doctors would usually be expected to provide; extraordinary care is not always appropriate and might be painful and unnecessary sometimes.
What is extraordinary medical treatment?
Extraordinary means of preserving life are those treatments, medicines, and operations which are gravely burdensome to the patient, and which cannot be obtained or used without excessive expense, pain, or other inconvenience or which, if used, would not offer a reasonable hope of benefit to the patient.
What happens in extraordinary measures?
A drama centered on the efforts of John and Aileen Crowley to find a researcher who might have a cure for their two children's rare genetic disorder. A Portland couple have two children with Pompe disease, a genetic anomaly that kills most before a child's tenth birthday.
What is ordinary and extraordinary?
Thus the doctrine of ordinary and extraordinary means. states, in essence, that the good of saving life is morally obligatory. only if its pursuit is not excessively burdensome or disproportionate. in relation to the expected benefits.
Which of the following considerations determines whether a measure is ordinary or extraordinary?
Which of the following considerations determines whether a measure is ordinary or extraordinary? Whether the measure is likely to benefit the patient.
What is burdensome measure?
The term ‘burdensome’ refers to a negative effect of a particular measure or procedure. A procedure imposes burdens when it produces undesirable outcomes.
What does "safe" mean in medical terms?
The term ‘safe’ has less to do with positive effects but refers to the lack of negative effects. For the sake of clarity, we can use the term ‘burdens’ to include all the negative effects of a procedure and ‘benefits’ to include all positive effects, whether experienced in the present or anticipated in the future.
What is the opposite of burdensome?
The opposite of ‘burdensome’ is ‘beneficial.’. Benefits designate positive effects of a procedure; the good outcomes it brings about in the present as well as the positive results it is likely to effect in the future. The term ‘safe’ has less to do with positive effects but refers to the lack of negative effects.
What does "extraordinary" mean in euthanasia?
In 1973, the journal Pediatrics defined extraordinary means as “all medicines, treatments, and operations which cannot be obtained or used without excessive expense, pain, or other inconvenience for the patient or for others or which, if used, ...
What is the goal of a patient in his last days of life?
In all circumstances, our goal should be to love the patient in his last days of life, never shortening a life by withdrawing basic treatment.
When preparing our own advance medical directives, or when assisting others to do so, it is critically important for?
When preparing our own advance medical directives, or when assisting others to do so, it is critically important for us to know precisely where ordinary means of treatment end and extraordinary means begin.
Is there a moral obligation to keep a body alive after brain death?
A very real problem arises when artificial measures of resuscitation and life‑support become death‑delaying rather than properly life‑supporting. There is clearly no moral obligation to keep a body breathing and biologically alive after irreversible brain death has occurred.
Does the Catholic Church believe in extending life to the last minute?
Contrary to what pro‑euthanasia propagandists sometimes allege, the Catholic Church has never taught that every life must be extended to the last minute by all means possible. The Church teaches that God determines the time of death of every human being, and that it is just as impermissible to try to extend one’s life beyond that time as it is to attempt to end it before that time.
Is oxygen a treatment?
But food, water and oxygen are not “treatment” ― they are fundamental and necessary elements of medical care, and they are basic human rights. Just as a basic right (to life) was discarded for an artificially manufactured “right” (to privacy) in the drive to impose abortion, now another genuine basic right (to food and water) ...
What is the Catholic teaching on ordinary and extraordinary means?
The natural law and the Fifth Commandment* requires that all ordinary means be used to preserve life, such as food, water, exercise, and medical care.
What does the Catholic Church say about discontinuing medical procedures?
Discontinuing medical procedures that are burdensome, dangerous, extraordinary, or disproportionate to the expected outcome can be legitimate; it is the refusal of "over-zealous" treatment. Here one does not will to cause death; one's inability to impede it is merely accepted.
What is the obligation to provide normal care due to the sick in such cases?
The obligation to provide the "normal care due to the sick in such cases"1 includes, in fact, the use of nutrition and hydration.2 The evaluation of probabilities, founded on waning hopes for recovery when the vegetative state is prolonged beyond a year, cannot ethically justify the cessation or interruption of minimal care for the patient, including nutrition and hydration. Death by starvation or dehydrat ion is, in fact, the only possible outcome as a result of their withdrawal. In this sense it ends up becoming, if done knowingly and willingly, true and proper euthanasia by omission.
Does not will to cause death?
When a person has an underlying terminal disease, or their heart, or some other organ, cannot work without mechanical assistance, or a therapy being proposed is dangerous , or has little chance of success , then not using that machine or that therapy results in the person dying from the disease or organ failure they already have. The omission allows nature to takes its course. It does not directly kill the person, even though it may contribute to the person dying earlier than if aggressive treatment had been done.
Is nutrition and hydration a care owed to the patient?
In summary, nutrition and hydration, like bathing and changing the patient's position to avoid bedsores, is ordinary care that is owed to the patient. This is true even if it is delivered artificially, as when a baby is bottle-fed or a sick person is tube-fed.
Church Teaching: Ordinary and Extraordinary Means
Food and Water
- How many people who sit down at a McDonalds to eat a double quarter pounder with cheese, French fries, and Coke consider themselves to be undergoing medical treatment? As the late John Cardinal O’Connor once remarked, “When I visited the starving people in Ethiopia, I could hardly have imagined that providing them with food and water, even though artificially brought in from t…
Special Scenarios
- No person should be deprived of food and water as long as they can do him good. However, if their provision causes significant pain or discomfort in the very last stages of life ― when death is truly imminent, within a few hours ― then it may be permissible to withdraw them to avoid pain and suffering. If a stomach tube is causing a person pain, and he is within hours of death, nutriti…
Conclusion
- Unfortunately, pro‑euthanasia activists, just like pro-abortionists, will stretch any exception to the absolute limit. Many abortionists have said that all pregnancies “threaten the life of the mother.” Some people see tube feeding as extremely expensive and “financially burdensome,” but it is usually not much more expensive than mouth feeding, and can often be cheaper. The problem h…
Endnotes
- J.E. Schowalter, J.B. Ferholt, and N.M. Mann. “The Adolescent Patient’s Decision to Die.” Pediatrics, January 1973, pages 101 and 102. Joint Pastoral Letter of the Bishops of Ireland. “Human Life Is Sacred.” May 1, 1975. Printed in the English edition of L’Osservatore Romano, May 22, 1975, and reprinted in its entirety in the Daughters of St. Paul’s Yes to Life, pages 146 to 165…