This document discusses the concept of a good death and the role of euthanasia. It defines a good death as having preparedness, acceptance, being pain free, fulfilling last wishes, finding meaning in life, maintaining relationships, and being acknowledged as a whole person. Euthanasia is defined as a doctor prescribing lethal medicine to end a patient's life based on their request when dying from a terminal illness. The document argues that euthanasia can allow for a good death by helping one control their dying experience and escape unbearable pain, which are features of having a good death. However, it also notes there are arguments against euthanasia, such as the potential for abuse or incorrect prognosis.
2. Why should we bother speaking about a
good death and euthanasia?
• A good death is a part of a good life.
• People die only once. So, we have to know how to prepare for death.
• Euthanasia is a relative novel way to finish life at the hopsital.
• Euthanasia is not legal everywhere in the world.
3. Definitions
• Focus: Terminally ill dying people with unbearable suffering.
• A good death: the good dying experience before an impending death.
• A good death: needs and wants that are important at the end of one's
death.
4. Preparedness
• Not sudden.
• Not unexpected
• It gives enough time to orchestrate a good death on the basis of
satisfying one's needs and wants that are pertaining to the good dying
experience.
5. Acceptance
• One could not reach a good death if he is not peaceful.
• Anxiety disturbs to orchestrate a good death based on satisfying
personal needs and wants, which dying person has at the end of life.
• I am calm. It gives inner freedom and openness to engage with others
and organize social offers and legal matters.
6. Pain free
• A good death happens if one does not feel any pain.
• Pain elicits the inner discomfort that disturbs to orchestrate a good
death - satisfy needs and wants that are dedicated to the good dying
experience.
• Pain causes the feeling that life becomes meaningless. The interest of
life is lost.
7. The last wishes
• A person has a good death if he has the chance to realize the last
wishes.
• This gives the feeling that live has been lived to the fuller extent.
• It easier to leave the world when one knows life has been lived as fully
as possible.
8. Giving meaning to life
• A person has a good death if he knows his life has had meaning.
• Death is an insoluble problem. Death takes away everything from a
person.
• The satisfactory way to escape from death does not exist.
• People, work, suffering are the sources of meaning.
• The ceaseless cessation of 'Why/Because' to explain things could not
exist if life is meaningful.
• Death is what makes life meaningful at all.
9. Reationships
• A person has a good death if he maintains relationships with close
people.
• It gives hope.
• It helps to escape from solitude and the scariness of death.
• A final moment to say such words, like 'Please fogive me', 'I forgive
you', 'Thank you', 'I love you'.
10. The whole person
• A person has a good death if he is acknowledged as the whole person
with all his feelings and thoughts at the hosptical.
• It avoids feeling like a medical object.
• Emphatic healtcare workers help to have a good death.
11. Rumination. Part 1.
• A good death = the good dying experience when a person's impending
death is about to happen.
• A good death is orhestrated on the basis of satisfying personal needs
and wants, which a dying person believes, are pertaining to the good
dying experience.
• I have compiled my list of some needs and wants, which people often
wish to satisfy at the end of their life: Preparedness, Acceptance, Pain
free, The last wishes, Giving meaning to life, Relationships, The
whole person.
12. Rumination. Part 2.
• A good death = management of the dying experience. Construct and
give meaning to the dying experience.
• The more features of a good death a dying person experiences, the
better quality of a good death he has.
• Management of the dying experience can be called as death with
dignity. The feeling of peacefulness, strength, and self-control. The
sense that a person fights against the dying exeperience.
• The dying experience takes control over a dying person if he does not
orchestrate a good death.
13. Euthanasia
• Etymological meaning = gentle and easy death.
• The modern meaning = a doctor prescribes lethal medicine that kills a
patient based on the patient’s will and for the patient’s benefit.
• Euthanasia can be administrated voluntarily, involuntarily, non-
voluntarily.
• A dying person relieves never ending unbearable pain.
• Euthanasia sustains human dignity.
14. Arguments against euthanasia that
challange the idea of a good death
• Euthanasia is a form of killing person.
• Healthy people can start asking for euthanasia as a way to escape from
their painful existence.
• The prognosis of a terminal illness can be evaluated wrongly.
• The practice of euthansia can be abused for a doctor's personal
reasons.
• Terminally ill people might not think on a rational basis when
requesting voluntary euthansia.
15. Conclusion. Part 1.
• People are concerned with having a good life. A good death is a part of
a good life.
• Certain needs and wants that are pertaining to the good dying
experience.
• Management of the dying experience = good death.
• It gives the sense that a human being is autonomous. It gives human
dignity. A human being determines itself. The key characheteristic of
being a man.
16. Conclusion. Part 2.
• Euthanasia helps to escape from unbearable pain.
• It allows to control one's dying experience.
• Good death is equal to the management of one's dying experience in a
summarized way.
• Thus, we can have a good death by committing voluntary euthanasia.
1) Euthanasia allows to control dying experience. 2) Euthanasia makes
us escape from unbearable pain that diminshes human dignity.
• 1) and 2) I have claimed to be the features of a good death.