On WFLA Tampa now - Terri Schiavo review is denied

WFLA | August 22, 2003 | WFLA

[I still care]

Just heard on Tampa Radio news WFLA Terry Schiavo's review has been denied - the original judge will now set a time to pull Terri's feedings and start starving her...

God help a country where this is countenanced.

[nickcarraway]

All I can say is that having an independent doctor examine her (preferably more than one) would be a precursor before anything else. I think to deo anything before that is not in terri's best interest.

[menotyu]

I'm not angered, just passionate. Like that nurse's post (the one with the cool name)said where do you draw the line? Maybe in those 50 years there will be a "cure", a way of maybe regenerating the damaged parts of her brain so that she can become a functioning member of society. It's hope that keeps the parents going, it's hope that keeps anyone going in times of hardship, and let's pray that hope will touch this Judge's heart so that he will change his mind. Also if she is alive for the next 50 years and there is a "cure" for her, I hope after all the struggles and pain she's not broken by what was almost done to her by this judge and those who support this position.

[alisasny]

why cant people come up with the cash then to get rid of the husband? We are not talking huge sums of money. This has been going on since 91 and then sudden people show up????

NICK I am not heartless..... If I could have my wish let Terris parants take her and raise her and provide....in the meantime..... I personally would rather be dead.

[alisasny]

I do hear what your saying. I agree on most.

Let us go to bed tonight and simply pray for Terri.

[sarasmom]

"Let us go to bed tonight and simply pray for Terri."
I will bump that to the top.

But I would also like for you to be aware that there are people in this world who wish to cling to life, no matter how you or I think we would "feel" in their position.

Yes,pray for Terri, by all means.
Pray for all of us.
A judge in the State of Florida is about to sentence a woman accused of no crime, to death by starvation.
This is not a bitter family feud over a DNR order.
This is premeditated murder.

[ican'tbelieveit]

death by suffocation is humane? sometimes you have to make those choices.

[NautiNurse]

death by suffocation is humane?

?

What are you talking about?

[ican'tbelieveit]

you jumped on me for saying death by starvation was humane. i replied with the fact that my brother, taking his wife off of a ventilator, suffocated her. or lets talk about death penalties, gas, electricity, lethal injection. no "death" is humane. but you have to weight the pros vs the cons. sometimes letting someone go is better in the long run.

and if you will follow my posts, i did later on say that the reason i posted what i did was because all i saw on the thread was people slamming a husband. knowing the grief my brother went thru with his decision, i replied saying that it isn't always a bad decision.

[sarasmom]

I am certain NN wil get around to replying to you.
In the meantime,may I clearly explain to you that Terri is not on a ventilator.
Her sole "life support" function is a feeding tube.
She would not have needed the feeding tubes, if her husband had not conciously shopped her to several nursing homes, with ever escalating demands that basic physical therapy not be allowed.
AFTER he prevailed in an insurance settlement, several years after her trauma,THEN he started with the Terri wants to die crap.
Terri Shiavo's "case" is not even remotely similar to the agony your brother went through.Or the agony any loving family member faces when forced to decide an end of life DNR, or cessation of artificial life support, for a terminally ill, and suffering loved one.
This is murder.
And the State of Florida is an accessory to premeditated murder, if we allow this travesty to continue to the fruition Shiavo expects to have a ruling on, at 3:00pm, 08/25/03.
He said today,on WFLA radio, that the best medical expectation was 10 days to death, after he removes her feeding tube.
10 days.
10 days.????
How long do you think a healthy adult could survive absent all traces of food and water.
10 days?
Terri Shiavo is on the brink of death, because her husband wants her dead, and has persuaded a judge in Florida to help him kill her.
This is not the same situation your brother faced.

[NautiNurse]

I agree with sarasmon on all points. It appears your sister-in-law was terminally ill, and required advanced life support. A feeding tube is not considered advanced life support. Your brother made a difficult and agonizing decision. Beyond that, I do not know further details. I would imagine that your sister-in-law and your brother tried to fight the cancer when it was originally diagnosed.

On the other hand, Terri Schiavo is not terminally ill, nor does she require advanced life support. Thanks to her husband, she has not received therapy of any type in an attempt to improve her capabilities for thirteen years, despite a $750,000 award for that stated purpose. Doubting Michael Schiavo's devotion to Terri is very, very easy. He has been engaged to marry another woman for seven years, and they have a child together.

[Brandon]

I agree with sarasmon on all points. It appears your sister-in-law was terminally ill, and required advanced life support. A feeding tube is not considered advanced life support.

I am not going to get into who is right in this case, but the statement quoted above is incorrect.

First, the term at issue is not "advanced life support" -- it is "life sustaining treament". Life sustaining treatment is a broad category of interventions, ranging from intense use of ventillators, all the way down to artificial nutrition -- which is what this woman is receiving.

Hospitals in this country withdraw or withhold life sustaining treatment -- including artificial nutrition -- every single day or the year, when the case has been found to be hopeless. Best case, it is done because of the known wishes of the patient. Next-best-case, it is done because the people who know the patient well inform the physicians of what the patient would probably say if she were able to express her wishes. Last ditch case, when the patient lacks decision-making capacity, and there is no surrogate decisionmaker available, the physicians take the hopeless cases to the hospital Ethics Committee for a decision.

This may or may not be what this woman would have chosen for herself; I wouldn't know. I do know, from nearly 20 years experience in hospital administration, that this particular situation is every healthcare provider's nightmare: the patient unable to give her opinion, and close family members in bitter disagreement over what she would say if they were able to ask her. And I'm extremely confident that no healthcare provider would consider pulling life sustaining treatment, if they thought there was the slightest chance that the act could be construed as murder (as some on this thread have suggested).

My suggestion: Pray for the patient, that whichever way it works out, life or death, her suffering not be prolonged, and that her various family members find a way to heal the pain in their hearts.

[ican'tbelieveit]

IF YOU WILL FOLLOW MY POSTS I HAVE ALREADY ADDRESSED THIS PARTICULAR CASE... for all of you people jumping on me for not "following" along for information not given initially, just a handful of posters slamming a husband with no background info (and i did a quick google search before I posted) and giving me extreme explanations, you will see I have already changed my views on this. You are just as guilty of not reading all posts as you accused me of not reading up on the case.

[ican'tbelieveit]

please reference 112.

[The Coopster]

Do you think there's a chance that all of you don't have the facts? The only sources I ever see referred to are semi-hysterical and 1-sided websites/quotes/etc generated by her family.

I'm not necessarily agreeing with the husband here. But don't you think if the majority of people surrounding this case were as indignant as you, then the situation would be different?

[NautiNurse]

I am just a lowly pit nurse who made a career with hands-on caring for patients just like Terri Schiavo, and many in much, much worse condition. Splitting administrative terms is not my forte--and that includes the verbiage "artificial nutrition." Are newborns in the nursery labeled as requiring artificial nutrition when their mothers do not breast feed?

Perhaps I would draw the line between advanced life support and your term "life sustaining treatment" for equipment that requires electricity, constant monitoring, and/or a skilled nursing facility. But---a tank of oxygen could fall into that category. Should we shove through the court system all patients at home requiring oxygen? How about insulin dependent diabetics? Their condition certainly requires more intensive monitoring than Terri Schiavo's tube feedings.

Terri Schiavo requires none of the above. Her blood relatives are quite willing and able to provide periodic tube feedings for her in their own home.

[Nataku X]

Your story is very sad but unfortunately not at all uncommon. I saw this kind of thing going on all the time in the geriatic hospital I volunteered at.

I would rather die childless than to experience the heartbreak I see the elderly go through all the time. Can you imagine your last few days being spent knowing that your beloved grandchildren were trying to kill you for your money? Today's society wants to put the disabled and the elderly up in a box while the healthy and able themselves have fun.

[mict42]

The Democrat courts have now sanctioned the killing of the lame. They had previously sanctioned the killing of those humans too young to defend themselves. They have stricken the name of God from public buildings. They side with aberrant and permit juries to render racially selective verdicts. They tell us that we are criminal to posses the means to defend ourselves and imprison us if we won't support their legally questionable indentured servitude. This country is now in the sad condition that we find it because most of us chicken ----. We are afraid to put it on the line as our ancestors most nobly sacrificed. I don't think that we can pull out of this tail spin without this sacrifice to once again, somehow, find it's nerve.

[Brandon]

You are neglecting the other criteria that must exist before such a decision is made. This woman is reported to be in a vegetative state. Some family members and others have reported seeing eye movements, but if you are a nurse who is experienced in caring for the critically ill, then you know that family members will sometimes see things that they want to see, or interpret autonomous movements as volitional.

The distinction I drew was not an arbitrary one, nor is it unimportant. It is the sort of standard that is used every day in hospitals all across the country, as patients and their families and caregivers struggle with these sorts of decisions.

This situation, as I have seen others note in other threads on this subject, is one massive PSA for advanced directives -- a living will, with treatment preferences explicitly stated, and a durable power of attorney for health care naming your surrogate decision maker if you are unable to decide for yourself. If you do not have these documents, and fall into a state that doesn't allow you to make your own decisions, those decisions will be made by your closest adult relative -- in this case, the spouse. If there are other family members who disagree, unless the decision making authority is clearly being abused, they are out of luck.

[NautiNurse]

You are neglecting the other criteria that must exist before such a decision is made.

As are you. Terri is not in an acute care facility (e.g. hospital). She is not critically ill.

This is not a case for pulling the plug. This woman has never had any form of rehab afforded her when $750,000 was awarded for this specific purpose. This woman has been neglected by her spouse.

[sweetliberty]

"Her husband has been trying to kill her for some time and it looks like he will succeed."

Perhaps she will fool them and start being able to eat. Bet that would PO her husband. Or if that were to happen would they withhold food too? Could happen. God is still in the miracle business, but then maybe He will just take her to a better place. I hope the husband's conscience haunts him for the rest of his life.