Jim Waun, a retired anesthesiologist, shares some of his personal experiences that led him to support the Death With Dignity movement and the Final Exit Network (FEN), and he explains how FEN’s Exit Guide program works.
The idea suggested by some disability rights advocates, that most of us will be disabled in one way or another by the time we reach the end of our lives, has been borne out in my experience. Virtually everyone I have known who has died has met, days or weeks or months before their deaths, the definition of disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act. How can we assure that those who are disabled are not coerced into ending their lives too soon?
Understanding disagreements between DWD advocates and disability rights advocates may be a way to find some common ground between the two groups. This is Part 1 of a multi-part series exploring the issues.
Oregon’s Death With Dignity Act (DWDA), implemented in 1998, was a monumental step forward in pursuing the primary goal of permitting those suffering from illness or disease to hasten their own death. But its advocates realized that, out of political necessity, it was not a universally applicable law, covering everyone in need. And the DWDA did not assure that all people have excellent medical care to meet their needs, though Oregon did dramatically improve palliative care in the state, diminishing the need for many people to make use of the DWDA.
Usually, when we talk about suffering, we are thinking of physical suffering. But there are many people with severe, unresolved, debilitating mental illness who can find no relief from their suffering – suffering that is just as real (though its cause is different) as that experienced, for instance, by a patient at the end stages of pancreatic cancer, or a patient dying of metastasized prostate cancer. And none of the existing programs and services can help those with unrelenting mental illness die a peaceful death – a good death – to put an end to their suffering.
