Malnutrition of elderly Scots is 'euthanasia'

Baptist Press ^ | 7/30/10 | Baptist Press

[wagglebee]

WASHINGTON (BP)--Government-run hospitals in Scotland are guilty of a "form of euthanasia" by malnutrition, a patients' organization leader has charged.

Jean Turner, executive director of the Scotland Patients Association (SPA), said hundreds of patients, especially the elderly, are undernourished in National Health Service (NHS) hospitals because of a lack of assistance from staff members, according to The Herald of Glasgow, Scotland.

About 50,000 patients die in a state of malnutrition each year at NHS facilities, according to one recent report.

"The SPA would call this a form of euthanasia to allow dehydration and malnutrition to develop due to lack of awareness, lack of staffing or carelessness," Turner said, according to The Herald's July 4 story.

The patients' organization has urged the Scottish government to urgently tackle the problem of malnutrition of the elderly in the nation's hospitals. Turner indicated the problem stems from staff who do not help patients who cannot feed themselves.

One woman died of kidney failure, The Herald said, after 14 weeks in a hospital, and her family believes poor standards of care, particularly in nutrition, contributed to her death.

"Staff would tell me, 'It takes an hour to feed your mother and we don't have an hour,'" one family member told the newspaper, adding, "We believe that the care she received in that hospital is the reason she is not here today."

Turner said the case is one of many.

"If patients do not manage to swallow food, nutritious or otherwise, and drink then they will not heal, their general health will deteriorate and death may be an outcome, sooner or later," Turner said.

"... Whatever happened to measuring input and output and keeping charts to prevent this? We are in no doubt many wards short-staffed and staff do not have the time that they know is needed to provide the best care, but SPA would say it is down to all staff to be accountable and raise their issues of concern."

When the hospital staff is aware that a patient has difficulty eating, the patients' organization said it expects them to help the patient eat, The Herald reported.

Compiled by Baptist Press Washington bureau chief Tom Strode and staff writer Erin Roach.

[Venturer]

That isn’t a hospital and that isnt a nursing staff.

Even in America the care your parents get is directly associated with the visit’s you make, but this isnt care at all it’s gross negligence.

[texmexis best]

The Healthcare system from Hell.

[ClearBlueSky]

Scotland?
How about here! My father had a stroke that left him unable to speak orswallow( this was before Katrina at THE biggest hospital here) and a doctor suggested that I let him STARVE instead of putting in a feeding tube. He said it would take about a week and it was painless, he would just ‘weaken and go easy’! I told him he should work in a funeral parlor, since he was more interested in death than life.
I authorized the feeding tube. I saw it as no different than using a plastic spoon to feed my father- an instrument , no different than feeding someone paralyzed who couldn’t feed themselves.
The doctor was amazed that I didn’t think witholding food was a humane way of ‘letting my dad go’.
Intentionally letting someone starve is MURDER. No different than locking them in a basement and not feeding them.
The attitude is HERE, people, in our doctors and our hospitals. If you don’t think so- wait till you have an elderly loved one need treatment.
That was 2004. My dad lived for a year with the feeding tube-evacuating for Katrina and coming back to this pest hole killed him. But the doctors wanted him dead because of his age!

[goodnesswins]

Just curious....was your father mentally alert? To the best of his ability considering the stroke?

[wagglebee]

I fully expect that a great many of us will be imprisoned for our belief in traditional Judeo-Christian morality. Our Lord promised us eternal life with Him, but He also told us that many of us would suffer for our beliefs.

[wagglebee]

Thanks for posting this.

I am well aware that this same barbarity is far more common in America than most people know.

[ClearBlueSky]

He had dementia, but he could speak. Didn’t much except to ask for things, or people.
I felt they considered him ‘disposable’ because of dementia and age( and told them so!) and the doctor clearly expected me to agree that death by starvation was better for everyone.

[Smokin' Joe]

Starvation is a weapon of mass destruction. Stock your pantry, and don’t keep it all in one place. It’s going to be a long run...

[goodnesswins]

THANKS....my husband and I are in the midst of updating our Will, and the Attorney wanted us to fill out the “Advanced Directive”....but, I did not like it.....so, am still debating on what to write in the ONE I WRITE on my own. Your post helps.

[RoadTest]

Government makes a very poor substitute for God.

[yefragetuwrabrumuy]

This is a general problem in medical care today. If an elderly family member goes to the hospital, any hospital, do not assume that their needs are being met in “common care” areas.

A family member being a “squeaky wheel”, will help insure that they are fed and given water, that they are washed and their linens changed. Inquiries with the nursing staff will insure that the nurses know why the patient is there, and this acts as an error check in several ways.

Administrative errors are often glaring. No, grandfather does not need a hysterectomy. His physician is not Dr. Kevorkian. His living will does not say “smother with pillow while asleep and remove internal organs.”

It is a good idea that when visiting them, at least once to check their hospital dossier, to make sure their finances, insurance, wills and other documents are in order. This is a hospital’s bread and butter, but mistakes can and do still happen.

[DesertRhino]

I would enjoy reading a murder mystery. The plot would revolve around the systematic assassinations of people such as Baroness Warnock, and her American counterparts like Peter Singer who advocate that others have a “duty to die”.

A novel involving how things might unfold if someone developed a similar opinion about *their* lives.
Something on the order of “unintended consequences”.
It could explore the reactions of these “elites” who never realized until the murders began, that someone else might think they might also have a “duty to die”, to preserve their intended victim’s life and liberty.

A good saturday afternoon read :)

[DesertRhino]

It amazes me that they somehow are sure that THEY get to decide for us, but never seem to think that someone else might try to decide for them. Who in the hell ARE these people?

[stars & stripes forever]

This is from the Baptist Press, not sure if you want to ping it or not.

Why wouldn't you want to ping an article from the Baptist Press?

Christians have the same Father, same Spirit, same Son.

United we stand, divided we fall.

[Palladin]

Before the concentration camps and the cyanide gas chambers, Germany used starvation to clear out the nursing homes and orphanages. The elderly, the disabled, and the unwanted children were considered “useless eaters.”

This was in the 1920’s, before Hitler.

We are on the same path.

[joelt]

Ezekiel Emmanuel is taking notes somewhere.

[wagglebee]

Why wouldn't you want to ping an article from the Baptist Press?

Tutstar has the Baptist ping list, I was just letting him know.

Christians have the same Father, same Spirit, same Son.

United we stand, divided we fall.

Amen!

[wagglebee]

Before the concentration camps and the cyanide gas chambers, Germany used starvation to clear out the nursing homes and orphanages. The elderly, the disabled, and the unwanted children were considered “useless eaters.”

This was in the 1920’s, before Hitler.

Actually, it was Hitler (though it had been suggested in the 1920s), but it was one of the first things he did.

Nazi Euthanasia Program

October, 1939 - Nazis Begin Euthanasia of Sick and Disabled

Named: the baby boy who was Nazis' first euthanasia victim

Euthanasia in Nazi Germany - The T4 Programme

Useless Eaters

Sermon Delivered by Bishop Clemens August Count of Galen on August 3, 1941

“This person suffering from hereditary defects

costs the people 60,000 Reichmarks during his lifetime.

People, that is your money. Read ‘New People’.”

[BfloGuy]

I read a book back in the 90's about a black reporter for the Washington Post who was assigned to Africa. He was very excited to be returning to his "roots".

His story, though, was one of extreme disappointment as he observed that human life over there was worthless. He described the picture of hundreds of thousands of corpses floating down a river and contrasted it with America where each death results in coroners' inquiries and police investigations.

This situation in Scotland sounds more like Africa than the great Western civilization we thought was timeless.

[robertwalker62]

You’re not kidding at all - the English are exactly like that.