Vincent Lambert

[idun]

This has been going on for so long. A nightmare for everyone concerned, a loved one in an accident and ending up on life support.

His wife believing that as life support is the only thing keeping him alive, his life over and she and the doctors believe that it is time to stop treatment, the mother not wanting the plug pulled.

And it has been through all the french courts and now the European Courts have said that the Doctors can stop all treatment.

I am not sure what the mother wants. She says that she and the rest of the family will care for him and will use other methods to delay her son's death, but why. Maybe she believes in miracles, and if one is going to happen, maybe it would happen when the plug gets pulled, why not then?

http://www.huffingtonpost.fr/2015/06/04/vincent-lambert--fixe-arret-cedh-que-va-t-il-se-passer-maintenant_n_7509986.html

So this is for information really and will change french law as it is a test case.

Personally I already have a 'do not resuscitate' made out, and hate the idea that my loved ones could leave me like that.

[Quillan]

Because it is not for the benefit of the patient but of the family which apart from being selfish on their part is a disgrace. We would not treat an animal this way let alone a human being. I am glad the ECHR has come down in favour of the hospital and it is for reasons like this that we need the ECHR because politicians are unable to make these decisions themselves for fear of losing votes.

[Val_2]

My husband was kept going by a machine when clinically dead and had to be so because we had agreed to organ donation but.....no way could any of us have kept him like that knowing he would never be the same again even if he did regain consciousness which we knew was impossible from seeing the scanner image of a dead brain. Not only that, keeping someone alive with no hope of a recovery is taking up a valuable machine and bed that could save someone else especially a child! We knew OH would never want to be a vegetable and neither would I or my children,that is not fair to anyone.

[Quillan]

[quote user="Val_2"]My husband was kept going by a machine when clinically dead and had to be so because we had agreed to organ donation but.....no way could any of us have kept him like that knowing he would never be the same again even if he did regain consciousness which we knew was impossible from seeing the scanner image of a dead brain. Not only that, keeping someone alive with no hope of a recovery is taking up a valuable machine and bed that could save someone else especially a child! We knew OH would never want to be a vegetable and neither would I or my children,that is not fair to anyone.[/quote]

It is a terrible decision to make but you need to think of the person in the bed and not yourself. I admire people like yourself who have the strength to put their loved ones before anything else and hope that if I was in the same position as yourself that I could be equally as strong. Likewise I don't want to be resusitated if I would be left in a vegative state. I have been resusitated after a heart attack but my wife and I have always agreed that once past 25 minutes stage no futher effort should be made.

[PaulT]

Val I hope you have gained some good feelings that your OH has helped others who have the ability to survive.

If someone is brian dead then basically, they are dead. Having someone on life support, especially for years merely prolongs the agony.

[Val_2]

That was the point, my son and I were shown the scans by the head consultant in the ITU and they were just black so it was clear he was never going to be alive again.Even after the stroke he was conscious for a couple of days but completely paralyzed and we had always discussed the fact that neither of us would want to just exist in a hospital bed until we expired. If you kept someone going for years like this poor man in the discussion, how do you justify it? You would literally have to be living by his bed day after day which is not normal and destroys the rest of the family at the same time.My own mother is in a home since 2007 when she suffered a paralyzing stroke but she is compus mentus and can go out in a wheelchair but...I have seen my father and two sisters' lives reduced to visiting her every single day and how their lives have been ruined by the feelings of guilt if they have a day off.If she could speak I am sure mum would tell them off for going but its all to do with guilt and I suppose the family of this man in the coma feel the same but they really should let go now and let him go with dignity.

[Rabbie]

This highlights an issue that all of us should discuss with our nearest and dearest. Mrs Rabbie and I have discussed this and we would make the same decision as Val in similar circumstances. Of course I would not want the life support system turned off before any of my transplantable organs had been taken but otherwise I have no desire to live as a cabbage.

[Val_2]

Here the doctor in charge of the patient has to ask the relatives about donation and we had already signed upto ADOT for some years previously anyway but usually life support is not turned off until permission is given because the body needs to continue to keep the precious organs for donation in good order although they are deteriorating little by little.We were shocked when we were told OH was only the third person on the list of donors for the area since a dedicated retrieval team had been installed at the hospital for four years already, people really should think about it seriously but unfortunately here, religious brainwashing has deterred people from allowing it, yet I bet most of them wouldn't turn down the opportunity of a life saving transplant for them or their families if it was offered! Another way of looking at it is if you have a horror of being cremated or buried alive as there is a condition which can render a human to appear so with the faintest of hearbeats not easily detectable,,at least you won't be with most of your bits missing. Sorry, black humour

[Gardengirl]

Maybe black humour, Val, but true.

I'm signed up to donate whichever parts of me can be used, fewer parts as time goes on, unfortunately. I firmly subscribe to that part of Arthur Hugh Cough's poem, that nobody should 'strive to keep (me) officiously alive.)

I want a green funeral at a site in beautiful countryside that we love and have specified the pub I would like family and friends to hold the wake at - a cheerful one, I hope.

I still haven't bought a space, should get a move on and do it!