Abstract

Comparing treatment team and the patients�?¢�?�?��?�?� perspectives regarding euthanasia (white death) in conscious patients connected to ventilator with long term ICU stay

Author(s):Seyyed Ali Naji, Shahrokh Yousefzadeh and Asra Remyad

With the current status of the technological and medical knowledge advancements the subject of the quality of death and the way one dies has become remarkably important. Such findings have also had their own influences. Therefore, the present study with the objective of comparing the treatment team and the patients’ perspectives regarding euthanasia in conscious patients connected to ventilator with long term ICU stays. the present research is an analytical-descriptive study which has dealt with the comparison of the 123 points of view from a treatment team (physicians and nurses) with 100 patients points of view in one of the therapy centers in Gilan Province based on the availability method. The data have been collected by making use of the questionnaires. The data were then analyzed through the use of SPSS software and the application of Spearman, Mann Whitney and Kruskal Wallis Utests as well. The results indicated that that the study population significantly opposed the conduction of euthanasia of any sort respective to the treatment team. There was not observed any significant statistical difference between the matched obtained scores from the general overview of the euthanasia in the studied patients based on the demographic variables (gender, age, education level and hospital stay duration) (P>0.05 in the entire cases). From the other side, according to the treatment team education level the results are indicative that the higher the education level of the treatment team the rate of euthanasia acceptance by them would be higher as well. considering the changes and evolutions advancement pace in the current era regarding technology, culture and other cases the medical sciences cannot be excluded from such a principle and the treatment team as the leaders in health area can enhance their care services through attracting the trust and confidence of the patients as the main treatment centers clients.

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