By Carrie Budoff Brown in Politico:

Legislators and political commentators are sparring over a provision tucked deep inside the House health care reform bill that would provide Medicare coverage for an end-of-life consultation once every five years, and more frequently for a life-threatening illness.

House Minority Leader John Boehner and Republican Policy Committee Chairman Thaddeus McCotter (R-Mich.) have issued a statement saying the measure “may start us down a treacherous path toward government-encouraged euthanasia.”

Betsy McCaughey, a former New York lieutenant governor and conservative health expert, said the measure amounts to pressure on vulnerable elderly and chronically ill people. “… it is not offering a service. It is pressuring them,” McCaughey said. “I would not want that to occur when I am not at my parents’ bedside.”

Proponents of the measure say it would not make the consultation mandatory. They say critics are using irresponsible rhetoric to drive a wedge between senior citizens and Democrats.

Earlier post here.

David Whelan, writing in Forbes, says the administration’s health care proposal is drawing criticism from disability rights advocates for a set of proposals pertaining to end-of-life care.

The bill would authorize Medicare to pay for a consultation between a patient and a doctor or nurse, to discuss how much or little medical care is desired in the event of incapacitation. An excerpt:

Opponents of ObamaCare argue that this five-page section of a 1,000-page bill is actually an attempt to pressure senior citizens into opting out of expensive live-saving therapy.

It brings to mind Boomsday, a 2007 satirical novel by ForbesLife editor at large Christopher Buckley, in which the government solves its fiscal problems by offering tax breaks to those who kill themselves before retirement age.

Writing in the Wall Street Journal, Betsy McCaughey says Congress is rushing to approve legislation that will “reduce access to care, pressure the elderly to end their lives prematurely, and doom baby boomers to painful later years.”

At the core of McCaughey’s concern is comparative effectiveness research, which can be used to limit care based on a patient’s age or expected lifespan. Using such a technique to limit access to care, she says, would deny lifesaving care to elderly people and those with disabilities.

She says the legislation being pushed by the White House aims to cut costs by “reducing access to treatments and counseling seniors about cutting life short” rather than finding more reasonable solutions.

McCaughey is a former lieutenant governor of New York.

From the [Toronto, Canada] National Post:

Barbara Farlow and her husband Timothy are facing what is expected to be the end of their legal challenge to Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children over the 2005 death of their daughter Annie, who had Trisomy 13. If a judge rules today that the case cannot be heard in small claims court, as expected, the Farlows have said they will withdraw their challenge for lack of funding.

Barbara Farlow has claimed that the hospital denied Annie proper treatment, issued a “do not resuscitate” order without her parents’ consent, and gave her a lethal dose of painkillers as part of  an unspoken policy to deny life-saving treatment in the case of infants with genetic disorders.

She says she wishes not to blame doctors but to provoke a broader discussion about the discriminatory policies used to treat children with disabilities.

[Barbara Farlow] said the trend in genetic screening for birth defects is “discriminatory,” in that people who choose to terminate genetically abnormal pregnancies are offered care and support, but those who choose not to are “on their own.” Once Annie was born, she alleges, she was falsely told doctors would provide life-saving care for her respiratory distress and other ailments related to Trisomy 13, when in fact, she alleges, they intended to let her die naturally.

Earlier posts here and here.

(Photo from the National Post)

Advocacy group says patients with disabilities were denied routine treatments

From the Wisconsin State Journal:

A group of disability rights advocates has filed a lawsuit alleging that doctors at the University of Wisconsin Hospital broke the law by withholding treatment from two unnamed patients with developmental disabilities who developed pneumonia. One of the patients died.

The University of Wisconsin maintains that the hospital was trying to follow the wishes of the families involved, and was acting in the best interest of both patients. Legal experts say the lawsuit could have broad implications in determining how much power families and guardians have to withhold care from vulnerable patients.

Disability Rights Wisconsin contends that state law prevents parents and guardians from withholding routine treatment for patients unless they are in a “persistent vegetative state,” a condition the lawsuit said did not apply to the two unnamed patients.

“What is at stake in this case is no less than patients’, parents’ and families’ ability to make private health care decisions in the best interests of the patient,” UW spokeswoman Lisa Brunette said in a statement.

From the Toronto [Ontario] Star, Global News Canada:

The parents of Annie Farlow, an infant who died at an Toronto hospital in 2005, are pressing a claim before the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal alleging that their daughter received inadequate care because the hospital withholds life-saving treatment from infants with disabilities.

Barbara and Tim Farlow say their daughter, who was born with Trisomy 13, was admitted to Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children with breathing problems but did not receive proper care because a “do not resuscitate” order was issued without their knowledge or consent.

The Farlows’ concerns are similar to those raised by the Wallace family last week, who alleged that staff members at the same hospital suggested that they stop feeding their daughter Kaylee and let her starve because she has a rare brain disorder. Jason Wallace said he was told that the hospital had to consider how much money Kaylee’s care might cost.

(more…)

Rushing to judge others — the Toronto Star. An excerpt:

[Jason] Wallace’s daughter, two-month-old Kaylee, has a rare medical condition and doctors had said she was unlikely to live long. Wallace and his wife Crystal Vitelli hoped their daughter’s heart could be donated to save the life of another desperately ill infant, one-month-old Lillian.

But when Kaylee was removed from a respirator she didn’t immediately die, so that transplant didn’t take place. Then the public recriminations began.

Public comments posted on one newspaper’s website included accusations that Wallace would rather have his daughter die than live with the inconvenience of a severely disabled child.

… We should not rush to judge, especially when we don’t know all the circumstances or possess all the facts. From a distance, it is difficult to appreciate the personal anguish someone else is going through.

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