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To: kimmie7
From my post 1983.

"Although the Cruzan decision limits rights of families in Missouri to make end-of-life decisions for incompetent patients, Dr. Smith does not back a health-care-surrogate law, like those in other states. On the contrary, he worries that legislative involvement might open the door to further restricting patient and family rights.

"All we need is for the Supreme Court in this state to rule that surrogates can remove artificial feedings from terminally ill patients and patients in a persistent vegetative state."

Rather than lobbying for laws, Dr. Smith said, he would like to see Missourians march on the state capital to protest "the hundreds of thousands of dollars spent to care for patients in persistent vegetative states and the money spent to hire private lawyers to block families from doing the right thing." He shared his experiences as a doctor who has helped patients and families who wanted to withdraw respirators, tube feeding and other life-sustaining treatments in Missouri, one of the states with the most restrictions on when such care can be withdrawn...."

I followed the link you posted for Florida law and there was a section on health care surrogates.

2,053 posted on 09/07/2003 11:32:35 AM PDT by MarMema
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To: MarMema
"All we need is for the Supreme Court in this state to rule that surrogates can remove artificial feedings from terminally ill patients and patients in a persistent vegetative state."

Funny how this neuro said it this way,when what I think he really worries about is if the health care surrogates stop the removal of tube feedings, not bring them on.

2,055 posted on 09/07/2003 11:51:10 AM PDT by MarMema
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