Thank you.
According to the Denver Post, CHI was formed in 1996 through the consolidation of four Catholic health systems. That same year, CHI teamed with Adventist Health System to jointly operate Centura Health, which has 17 hospitals in Colorado and is based in Centennial. But that was never in question.
The problem is that the law, developed by Colorado, in 2016, states that Proposition 106 permits terminally ill patients with under six months to live, as determined by two physicians, to self-administer aid-in-dying drugs to voluntarily die. To be eligible, the patient must be at least 18 years old, determined mentally capable by two physicians, and able to communicate an informed decision. Receiving aid-in-dying drugs requires one written request, witnessed by at least two other persons, and two oral requests. The measure also allowed a physician to prescribe the lethal drug to a terminally ill patient under certain conditions. Health providers and facilities are not required to prescribe or dispense aid-in-dying medication. In addition, Proposition 106 criminalized coercing a patient with a terminal illness to request the drug.
Doctor Barbara Morris, who wanted to prescribe lethal drugs to a 64-year old patient, Neil Mahoney, in order to end his life, was terminated after she asked a state court to declare that Centura Health’s faith-based policy was in violation of the Colorado state law. She was not fired for the act of doing it or even prescribing the drugs. She was fired because she wanted to challenge the Hospital, in court, for a legal clarification of the law.
And you, as a physician, I’m sure can totally understand that when the institution can prescribe medication or procedure, they have overstepped their bounds. And only a legal definition by a court can answer the questions involved. And when she tried to get them, she was fired for her efforts toward the legal use of the law. The hospital over stepped their capacities by terminating her.
rwood
except that the contact one signs for employment with the system states that one will abide by the companies moral and ethical standards. She is employed by Centura and therefore practices under their rules. Don’t like the rules? go work for another institution.