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I just found this note. I was writing a response to individual items with specific suggestions for help as I got angrier and angrier reading through this thread, and then I started crying when I saw post #118 that your mother had died.

I'm still responding because I believe some good can come out of this situation. Many, many, many other Freepers, as TropicanaRose pointed out with regard to her retired RN mother, have not thought through what it means to live in an environment where we can no longer assume doctors and hospitals are there to save lives.

Something similar happened to my mother, not at the Roman Catholic hospital where she was in the ICU (which did the right thing) but at a nursing home of my mother's once-evangelical denomination to which she was transferred after leaving the hospital, and which I discovered too late had a notorious anti-life professor among its board members. There are important differences in details, but the bottom line is that I am absolutely convinced my badly dehydrated and starving mother expected to get food and water in the nursing home, lapsed into unconsciousness due to lack of food and water, and from that point on nothing could be done because she was no longer able to make decisions on her own.

The key lesson for others in this situation is that people need to get seriously ill relatives into hospitals and under the care of doctors who share your values.

A second lesson is that MestaMachine is right about the need to make sure a patient has not signed medical documents that you don't know about. Patients are in the hospital because they are sick, and by definition they may lose consciousness or not fully understand what they are signing. Anyone in a potential end-of-life situation needs to have trusted (and TRUST is a key word, don't assume, but ASK what the “trusted” person really thinks) people who can exercise a medical power of attorney, just in case. Depending on state law, it may be critical to get a living will or similar document that **SPECIFICALLY** makes clear that food and water are to be provided. A pro-life lawyer familiar with your state's laws is helpful and may become absolutely essential.

Without those two steps — a doctor sharing your values and a legal document allowing you to make the decisions you know that your mother wants — nothing else will work.

Also, the advice of Brad’s Gramma and Chickensoup is important. No matter how much you trust the hospital, make sure someone is in that room **EVERY HOUR OF EVERY DAY.** That applies even at the best hospitals (good hospitals can hire bad RNs and LPNs). I am aware of horrific situations, up to and including rapes of patients by male nurses, but uncaring and underpaid staff are a more common problem. The simple physical presence of a family member will deter most cases of staff abuse or neglect.

Finally, I really, really, **REALLY** hate to say this as an evangelical Protestant, but based on my own experience, I'd choose a Roman Catholic hospital over nearly all secular hospitals and many Protestant hospitals in dealing with potential end-of-life issues, unless I was absolutely sure the Protestant hospital clearly shared my values on these issues. There are certain benefits to having a Pope and a hierarchy when they're right, and on this issue of active or passive euthanasia, the **ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH IS RIGHT.** The Roman Catholic Church will (or should) force Catholic hospitals to follow the rules. I'm not naive enough to think bad things don't happen in Roman Catholic hospitals, but I think under current conditions, the bishops are generally pretty good at enforcing the church's position on pro-life issues.

Doctors are supposed to be saving lives, not discouraging life-saving treatment — and providing food and water isn't even **CLOSE** to life-saving treatment.

May God bless you and your family in a horrific situation.