Throughout this paper I will explore and analyze various reasons as to why the 28-year-old patient has the right to refuse the PEG feeding tube surgery along with further medical treatment. Although this refusal has lead her medical team to feel guilty, proper information and respect of autonomy must triumph over personal emotions. One may argue that the doctors in her team took an oath to do no harm, however prolonging her suffering and overriding her wishes is a form of harm to the patient. Rather than insisting on the surgery, the medical team should provide her proper understanding of the consequences of her action. Furthermore, each individual should look at her situation in a moralistic standpoint. Meaning, there insistency to keep her
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This concept was derived from Kantianism, “an ultimate principle that people should always be treated as ends in themselves” (Kuhse and Singer 34). In lecture, Dr. Rulli summarized it as “to treat them as an instrument to you achieving your own ends” (Lecture 4, October 6). If the medical team overrides this patient’s wish, then they will be acting on their personal self gratitude and selfishness to avoid the complicit feeling of letting her die. Furthermore, this will reflect her illness as a cause of being unequal in terms of social standing with everyone else. Her voluntary decisions are disregarded over the medical team who believes they know what’s best for her only in the scope of medicine. In the end of the day, her physicians and nurses aren’t the ones who suffer under cerebral palsy. To further elaborate on the idea of treating someone as a mere means, it is “to involve them in a scheme of action to which they could not in principle consent” (Lecture 4, October 6). Additionally, I believe even if a consent is given but disregarded for their own benefit, then it will equally be seen as an act of mere
This concept was derived from Kantianism, “an ultimate principle that people should always be treated as ends in themselves” (Kuhse and Singer 34). In lecture, Dr. Rulli summarized it as “to treat them as an instrument to you achieving your own ends” (Lecture 4, October 6). If the medical team overrides this patient’s wish, then they will be acting on their personal self gratitude and selfishness to avoid the complicit feeling of letting her die. Furthermore, this will reflect her illness as a cause of being unequal in terms of social standing with everyone else. Her voluntary decisions are disregarded over the medical team who believes they know what’s best for her only in the scope of medicine. In the end of the day, her physicians and nurses aren’t the ones who suffer under cerebral palsy. To further elaborate on the idea of treating someone as a mere means, it is “to involve them in a scheme of action to which they could not in principle consent” (Lecture 4, October 6). Additionally, I believe even if a consent is given but disregarded for their own benefit, then it will equally be seen as an act of mere