Food, Water & Life Support
The Food and Water Dilemma
16 page booklet – Nutrition and hydration, whether taken by mouth or administered through a tube, are basic necessities of life. Anyone, healthy or sick, will die from dehydration and starvation within a week or two when totally deprived of food and water.
Questions About Oxygen Therapy
Patient advocates routinely get asked about oxygen therapy as well as antibiotics and fluids. This discussion between Dr. John Campbell and Dr. John Tallinger covers vital information that would be helpful for loved ones, caregivers and advocates looking after the elderly especially when dealing with COVID-19. Watch the Video.
DO NOT Sign A DNR Order Before You Read This
A DNR (do not resuscitate) order means that efforts to revive a person will not be made in the event of cardiac arrest (the moment a person’s heart stops and breathing becomes impaired). Be wary. A DNR order may be misused or wrongly interpreted.
Once the decision has been made not to resuscitate a patient, there is the tendency to consider other treatments to be “futile,” resulting in the reduction of ordinary, beneficial care and treatment a patient wants, such as blood transfusions, antibiotics, intravenous lines, a ventilator, etc. Other frequent “side effects” of a DNR order are fewer visits from physicians and less nursing
care. [1] Read more…
“THEY ALMOST HANDCUFFED ME, AND I WAS
THREATENED FOR TRESPASSING”
My dad died early on a Wednesday. We have no doubt that the hospital staff murdered him.
This ordeal has been very painful for my son and me. I want to tell the whole world about what they did to my dad. I was sleeping in his hospital room when I started hearing buzzers and monitors at his bedside going off. No one came into the room to check on him, so I went out to the hallway and yelled for help. Finally, several nurses came in. Read more…
Questions And Answers Regarding
Assisted Nutrition And Hydration
Life, Life Support, And Death
Principles, Guidelines, Policies, and Procedures For Making Decisions That Respect Life
Some aspects of the euthanasia movement are clear, but many others are subtle, and the truth is not easily discerned. There is a paucity of truthful education regarding “brain death,” death with dignity, living wills, and death by dehydration and starvation. Everyone in society, especially physicians and all healthcare personnel, must become as familiar with these topics as they are with abortion. Abortion is just the tip of the euthanasia movement. Read more…
Articles
By Julie Grimstad
May 3, 2022
A DNR (do not resuscitate) order means that efforts to revive a person will not be made in the event of cardiac arrest (the moment a person’s heart stops and breathing becomes impaired). Be wary. A DNR order may be misused or wrongly interpreted.
Once the decision has been made not to resuscitate a patient, there is the tendency to consider other treatments to be “futile,” resulting in the reduction of ordinary, beneficial care and treatment a patient wants, such as blood transfusions, antibiotics, intravenous lines, a ventilator, etc. Other frequent “side effects” of a DNR order are fewer visits from physicians and less nursing care. [1] Read more…
By Paul A. Byrne, M.D. (used with permission)
May 11, 2020
Ventilators are in the public eye with the COVID-19 pandemic. Basic information about breathing is needed to understand what the ventilator can and cannot do to protect and preserve life.
The official name for the virus causing the pandemic is Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and for the disease is COVID-19. Naming the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) and the virus that causes it (Accessed 5-1-20) Read more…
What About Ventilators And “Pulling The Plug”?
By Nancy Valko, RN
Reprinted with the author’s permission from her blog: https://nancyvalko.com/2019/03/08/what-about-ventilators-and-pulling-the-plug/
When I first became a registered nurse in 1969, ICUs (intensive care units) were still new. The first one I worked was set up in the former visitors’ lounge. We learned how to read EKGs (heart tracings) by using a book. By the early 1970s, I worked in a surgical/trauma ICU where we used sophisticated ventilators. We were able to get almost all our patients off ventilators by weaning—the process of gradually lowering ventilator support until the patient can breathe on his or her own.
Read more…
Cases
The Doctor Was Dead Wrong
By Nancy Valko, RN
– May 2020
I had a patient in home health whose doctor tried to remove the
ventilator because “his brain stem was destroyed.” The wife refused. When I
went in to evaluate him before physical therapy was to start, I found him
alert, talking slowly and using his walker to get around. He even had a
delightful sense of humor! The wife was so glad she had fought the doctors.
Woman Kills Herself By Stopping Eating And Drinking
On its website, Compassion & Choices, the organization leading the campaign to legalize assisted suicide in every state, promotes Voluntarily Stopping Eating and Drinking (VSED) as an “option” for people who are struggling with chronic or incurable disorders and for people who are “simply ‘done’ after eight or nine decades of a fully lived life.” C&C ludicrously claims that suicide by starvation and dehydration is “a natural process of dying,” but warns, “Support is necessary, as you cannot safely do this alone.” Seriously?! Read more…
Her Doctor Avoided The Word “Starvation”
By Rosie G.
July 2020
This case exposes why every person should be extremely careful about the wording of their healthcare advance directive and choosing the person they want to make medical decisions for them in a critical situation. For information about advance directives, read “The Best Advance Directive” in Making a Difference.
My mother-in-law Helen, over a period of years, had a series of mini strokes without any permanent mental or physical damage. Then, about 10 years ago, she suffered a massive stroke which left her with limited abilities of speech and mobility and other disabilities. Her loving husband was by her side and her eight living children were called home to spend time with her. Read more…
COVID-19 Patient With Disability
Starved By Texas Doctor
July 2020
The following report from Texas Right to Life is a chilling example of the dehumanization of vulnerable patients that is happening right under our noses. This story will open your eyes to the threats to life that have taken root in our healthcare system. Please share this with everyone you know. We must reteach people how to respect and defend human life, and make it personal. Whatever hurts my brother or sister, my fellow human being, hurts me.
Read: Quadriplegic COVID-19 Patient Starved by Texas Doctor because of his Disability
Questions And Answers Regarding
Assisted Nutrition And Hydration