Lawmakers Grapple With End-of-Life Legislation
Texas lawmakers have grappled year after year over whether families or medical professionals should make the final decision on when to end a terminally ill patient’s life-sustaining care. This year, they seem closer to a compromise.
“If we were only making decisions based on medical facts, everything would be straightforward,” said Dr. Leigh Fredholm, the medical director of Seton Palliative Care at the University Medical Center Brackenridge in Austin. “But that’s not how we make decisions.”
State law allows physicians to discontinue treatment they deem medically futile. If a physician’s decision to end treatment contradicts the patient’s advanced directive or the judgment of the patient’s surrogates, state law gives patients or their families 10 days to find an alternative provider and appeal the physician’s decision to a hospital ethics committee.
Advocacy groups that identify as “pro-life” say existing law does not go far enough to protect the interests of patients or their families. But they are divided on how legislators should reform it. While support in the Legislature’s upper chamber seems to be coalescing around Senate Bill 303, which would tweak the existing process, some endorse bills that would prohibit physicians or hospital ethics committees from making the final decision to end treatment.
More at http://www.texastribune.org/2013/04/01/lawmakers-grapple-end-life-legislation/ .
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