"DEATH PANELS": Do You Believe They Exist?

Hey! Do you remember,starting in 2009,the political fury, concern and cries about "Death Panels" in the United States as the Affordable Care Act ("Obamacare") was being debated? If you don't..where were you? Wikipedia has an excellent article on this topic to refresh your memory.My understanding of what the public considers as a "death panel" would be a group of individuals not related to any specific patient but who becomes responsible to make a decisions as to what life-supportive treatment or other treatment would be allowed to be started or terminated for a patient. "Death" is used in the name since it is felt that death could well be the outcome of their decision. One way or another, it was this group "pulling the plug" on the patient's life-support. An example of such a concern prior to the Affordable Care Act was the matter of the Texas statute Section 166.046 passed in 1999. The statute stated "If an attending physician refuses to honor a patient's advance directive or a health care or treatment decision made by or on behalf of a patient, the physician's refusal shall be reviewed by an ethics or medical committee. The attending physician may not be a member of that committee. The patient shall be given life-sustaining treatment during the review." The patient or patient's surrogate may attend the meeting and receive a written explanation of the decision reached.  If the physician, patient or surrogate don't agree with the decision, then the physician must attempt...
Source: Bioethics Discussion Blog - Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Source Type: blogs