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Sigrid Dierickx received her PhD recently in Ghent, Belgium (End-of-Life Care research Group). Her dissertation called Euthanasia practice in Belgium, a population-based evaluation of trends and currently debated issues can be read and downloaded here in PDF format.

The aim of the dissertation was to provide population-based evidence on general trends in euthanasia practice in Belgium and on particular current issues being debated regarding euthanasia...

Lire « Euthanasia practice in Belgium A population-based evaluation of trends and currently debated issues »

WHEN I began working as a doctor early in the 1970s, end-of-life care was in its infancy. Cicely Saunders had just begun her pioneering work on what she called "total pain" and very few clinicians knew how to alleviate pain and distress in the dying. Today the situation is transformed. Palliative care has been recognised as a clinical speciality in Britain for 30 years; indeed, the country was ranked in first place in The Economist Intelligence Unit's Quality of Death index. For most people in Britain today, dying does not mean an agonising death, but a gentle ebbing away of life.

Why, then, as medical science has made enormous strides in alleviating the pain and distress of dying, are we seeing relentless campaigning for the legalisation of what is being euphemistically called "assisted dying"...

Lire « Laws are not just regulatory instruments but send a powerful social message »

Dr Koerselman said doctors should be helping people live positive lives – rather than assisting them in suicide.

People wanting euthanasia for psychiatric reasons need advocates who will stand with them and renew their hope, a Dutch psychiatrist says...

Lire « Instead of killing, we must give hope to patients asking for euthanasia »