Although the American Nurses Association (ANA) claims it represents the over 3 million US nurses, only a tiny fraction of nurses actually belong. ANA does not give out the actual number of members. I used to belong both my state nursing organization as well as the ANA to try to uphold good nursing ethics and conscience rights for nurses. I finally gave up when my state organization would not address even the conscience rights of nurses in the Nancy Cruzan feeding tube case. I gave up on the ANA when I discovered that the ANA opposed a ban on partial birth abortion without notifying its membership. I only found this out when I watched a TV show on politics mentioning the ANA position. I called the ANA public relations department myself to protest both their position and not notifying members like me and resigned.

Yesterday, I received a call from a nurse in another state who sent me the website for public comments due by 5 pm ET 12/1/2016 about a proposed new ANA position on nutrition and hydration at the end of life.

The proposed position paper is 9 pages long and I sent the following comments with the referenced lines as requested. It would have taken me many pages to address all the issues:

Lines 18-24.  In the past, the hospice principle of never prolonging or hastening death at the end of life was paramount. Now, this has been subjugated to a legalized autonomy (even when exercised by a third party) to decide when to hasten death.

However, nurses are professionals whose integrity depends on proper respect for their conscience rights, especially when it comes to decisions about hastening death.  This concern is absent in this draft.

We do have such a provision in Missouri law that states:

Missouri Revised Statutes
Section 404.872.1

Refusal to honor health care decision, discrimination prohibited, when.

404.872. No physician, nurse, or other individual who is a health care provider or an employee of a health care facility shall be discharged or otherwise discriminated against in his employment or employment application for refusing to honor a health care decision withholding or withdrawing life-sustaining treatment if such refusal is based upon the individual’s religious beliefs, or sincerely held moral convictions.

(L. 1992 S.B. 573 & 634 § 7)

Line 88: There is no definition of “severe neurological conditions”.
Line 90 on “Dementia, recognized as a terminal illness associated with anorexia and cachexia”.  As a former hospice nurse and caregiver for my mother until her death as well as a volunteer for people with dementia, this is an alarming and potentially dangerous assertion. No one should have to die by dehydration and indeed many people with dementia can be spoon-fed like my mother until natural death. I have likewise seen several people begging for food or water but denied because of a decision not to place a feeding tube or spoon feed.

Lines 101-104. VSED as described is really assisted suicide and implicitly changes ANA opposition to medically assisted suicide.

Also, in a New York Times article in October titled “The VSED Exit: A Way to Speed Up Dying, Without Asking Permission”, Dr. Timothy Quill (past president of the AAPHM and the doctor arguing for the constitutionality of assisted suicide in the 1997 Vacco v Quill US Supreme Court case) was quoted as claiming that while VSED is “generally quite comfortable at the beginning”, he also states that “You want a medical partner to manage your symptoms,” because “It’s harder than you think.”

How hard?

In 2000, Quill and Dr. Ira Byock (a palliative care doctor who speaks against legalizing physician-assisted suicide while also supporting VSED and terminal sedation) wrote an article titled “Responding to Intractable Terminal Suffering: The Role of Terminal Sedation and Voluntary Refusal of Food and Fluids” . The patient was a doctor who wanted to die before his symptoms became worse. He was given a morphine drip that had to be increased to total unconsciousness on day 10 because he became “confused and agitated and began having hallucinations”.

Lines 114-115 cite “Psychological, spiritual, or existential suffering, as well as physical suffering” but only say that “Symptom control is imperative” rather than oppose participation in VSED  for people who are not even terminally ill.

Lines 149-150 state that “Decisions about accepting or forgoing nutrition and hydration will be honored including those decisions about artificially delivered nutrition as well as VSED”. This blanket statement destroys the conscience rights of nurses as well as our duty to advocate for our patients’ best interests. (Emphasis added)

Ironically, the ANA’s 2010 position paper on reproductive rights (i.e. abortion) states that:

“Also,nurses have the right to refuse to participate in a particular case on ethical grounds. However, if a client’s life is in jeopardy, nurses are obligated to provide for the client’s safety and to avoid abandonment.” (Emphasis added) Apparently, the ANA is proposing that the right to refuse to participate ends when the death of the patient is deliberately intended.

CONCLUSION

Just this week, it was reported that a union for Australian nurses is backing voluntary euthanasia. The Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation (SA branch) is even partnering with other Compassion and Choices-style groups in Australia to pass a voluntary euthanasia bill. This could well be our future here in the US if we do not respond.

As nurses and citizens, we need to fight for truly patient-safe health care by responding to groups like the ANA through comments sections like the one above (which ends December 1) and in the media. We must also support and insist on ethical health care providers for ourselves and our loved ones as well as protecting our patients. As much as we can, we can also help state and national organizations that fight against euthanasia.

Especially if you are a nurse, consider joining the National Association of Pro-Life Nurses and following our Facebook page.

Our profession, our patients and even our nation are at stake!