Ethics-Governance: Article: MJA: Kuhse et al., End-of-life decisions in Australian medical practice

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MJA: Kuhse et al., End-of-life decisions in Australian medical practice End-of-life decisions in Australian medical practice Helga Kuhse, Peter Singer, Peter Baume, Malcolm Clark and Maurice Rickard MJA 1997; 166: 191For editorial comment see Van Der Weyden and Ashby Readers may print a single copy for personal use. No further reproduction or distribution of the articles should proceed without the permission of the publisher. For permission, contact the Australasian Medical Publishing Company Journalists are welcome to write news stories based on what they read here, but should acknowledge their source as "an article published on the Internet by The Medical Journal of Australia ". Objective: To estimate the proportion of medical end-of-life decisions in Australia, describe the characteristics of such decisions and compare these data with medical end-of-life decisions in the Netherlands, where euthanasia is openly practised. Design: Postal survey, conducted between May and July 1996, using a self-administered questionnaire based on the questionnaire used to determine medical end-of-life decisions in the Netherlands in 1995. Participants: A random sample of active medical practitioners from all Australian States and Territories selected from medical disciplines in which there were opportunities to be the attending doctor at non-acute patient deaths, and hence to make medical end-of-life decisions. Main outcome measure: Proportion of Australian deaths that involved a medical end-of-life decision, using ratio-to-size estimation based on the sampled doctors' responses to the questionnaire. The response rate was 64%. Results: The proportion of all Australian deaths that involved a medical end-of-life decision were: euthanasia, 1.8% (including physician-assisted suicide, 0.1%); ending of patient's life without patient's concurrent explicit request, 3.5%; withholding or withdrawing of potentially life-prolonging treatment, 28.6%; alleviation of pain with opioids in doses large enough that there was a probable life-shortening effect, 30.9%. Full Article: http://www.mja.com.au/public/issues/feb17/kuhse/kuhse.html


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