Commentary: When a feeding tube borders on the barbaric

Minneapolis Star Tribune ^ | May 28, 1997 | Dr. Ronald Cranford, MD

[BraveMan]

Understood. I digress . . .

In a free and just society, parents should not be denied by the courts the opportunity to care for their child in the manner they see fit. Matthew 6:24

[SerpentDove]

RealPlayer:

VIDEO #1

VIDEO #2

[MHGinTN]

And there are two types of tube feeding. With one, regular food in a balanced diet is purreed and pushed through the tube; with the other, a formula is pushed. Patients on regular food thrive over long duration; patients on the formula do not last so long as Terri has survived. She has a strong will to live, IMHO.

[fly_so_free]

OMG! That guy is talking just like a Nazi. He's rationalizing killing disabled children.... unbeleivable.

[nmh]

The old Hippocratic oath is no longer used. I'm not kidding. So what they are doing - death pushing is acceptable under the current oath. What traditional doctors abide by is what the insurance carriers will pay for. They knew insurance contracts better than treating medical problems.

Traditional docotrs prescribe according to the insurance contract hoping to make it up in volume. The best interest of the patients - is the LAST thing on their minds. I am not exaggerating or overstating this.

[Dustbunny]

This removal of a feeding tube really bothers me.

We arrest people that starve helpless animals but are condoning starving a helpless human being.

Maybe we need to call in the 'Humane Society'! (sarcasm off)

[MHGinTN]

PETA has been amazingly quiet! Don't they claim that humankind are after all merely animals?

[SerpentDove]

[ladyinred]

A Pox on this man's house, and any other curses anyone else can think of!

Murdering bunch of despicable creatures from the pit.

[MarMema]

It is the epitome of a culture that no longer recognizes love or goodness to be the value of life. It is a culture that values only one thing: convenience, function, some kind of production beyond consumption. That is a crass utilitarian culture.

Thank you for posting this!

[goldstategop]

My religious tradition forbids any act that hastens death. Its one thing if God takes a life, that's His Will and we're powerless in the matter. But if its a choice between saving a life and condemning a human being to death through conscious human volition, that's an easy choice to make. We should never deprive someone of food and water and watch them die. That's barbaric and we wouldn't treat our animals that way. When a loved one is in pain and suffering and maybe terminally ill, we have a duty to keep them alive and make them comfortable and pray that God will heal him or her or if Our Father in Heaven wants to put an end to their suffering then it is an Expression Of His Infinite Love And Mercy For His Children. But we must never for a moment, in matters of life and death, presume to place ourselves above God.

[Dianna]

If people really understood the reality of this dementia, I doubt they'd find it an acceptable lifestyle.

Unfrigginbelievable! Well, my goodness, being old and ill isn't an acceptable "lifestyle" so let's kill them off? I shouldn't be shocked, but I am.

A friend's mother had Alzheimers. She often said, with the state her mother was in (confused and upset the majority of the time), it would be a blessing for her to pass. I can understand THAT but it's a quite a distance to decide to kill them.

[Coral Snake]

This one should get the "Viking Kitties" attention in my opinion. We don't need full ARTICLES of this "Enlightenment"
pro death CR*P here.

Here Kitty, Kitty, Kitty.

ZZZZOOOOOTTTTT!!!!

By the way I didn't see you on my Prosicute Michael Schiavo
thread today. I pinged you because I thought you wanted to see it.

Guns, linux and Liberty. ;c)

[MarMema]

I did groceries and then spent the entire evening watching the session....let me go back into my pings...

[Greybird]

[...] medical advances in the area of pain control now allow doctors to so completely soothe intense suffering that this argument for accepting euthanasia has become virtually useless.

Unless you work for the DEA, and routinely threaten to deprive doctors of their livelihood (that is, their occupational licenses) if they use this pain control. Or even if they prescribe more than "the norm" of OxyContin.

[Dianna]

My religious tradition forbids any act that hastens death. Its one thing if God takes a life, that's His Will and we're powerless in the matter.

I struggle with this. I don't believe that medicine can keep anyone alive that God doesn't wish to live. Does that mean we keep fighting, always? Do we always have to do what we CAN do? I think that answer is sometimes no.

My grandfather had a heart attack while in the actual process of signing a DNR. Because the paper hadn't yet been signed they had to try to restart his heart. I was glad they didn't succeed. I wish they hadn't made his dying moment a crisis and a struggle.

[deannadurbin]

>>The old Hippocratic oath is no longer used.

Maybe we should pass a law to require that to be reinstated.

[goldstategop]

We all want our loved ones to live a full life. Usually its clear to us when they've reached the end of their lives. Sometimes it isn't and that's when its heart-wrenching. Its lives in "gray" areas where you have a difficult time reconciling your own beliefs with the reality of what's happening in front of your own eyes. No one said life was easy. Ultimately we have to make the decision we think is best for those we love and bear the consequences for the rest of our lives. Its called being human.

[mercy]

Every person knows when they have allzheimers. When it gets so bad that you are 'out' more than you are 'in' life is not worth living. I will never burden my family with my living corpse. A very long walk in the deep deep woods is in order. That's my choice. I would not have it forced on others. It just strikes me as supremely selfish to allow oneself to slip into vegetable land knowing you could last that way for as much as twenty years or more.

[keri]

Yes, we do need this information. Ronald Cranford was Michael Schiavo's neurologist. He testified against Terri and slammed three other doctors who had recommended swallowing tests be done on Terri. (They had seen Terri and filed affadavits in Greer's court. I think this must've been when Lazarra kicked it back to Greer, iirc)

Please, Don't call the kitties just yet. Instead google up cranford and schiavo...

We need to become a little more acquainted with Ronald Cranford.