Patient Autonomy Quotes

Politicians, please, think of yourselves! Move to help Terri Schiavo, and no one will be mad at you, and you'll keep a human being alive.

In working with those who are dying, I offer another human being a spacious environment with my mind in which they can die as they need to die. I have no right to define how another person should die. I'm just there to help them transition, however they need to do it.

In the event that my illness worsens, I want to have a guarantee that I can die in a dignified manner. Nowhere in the bible does it say that a person has to stick it out to the decreed end. No one tells us what "decreed" means.

Of all the arguments against voluntary euthanasia, the most influential is the 'slippery slope': once we allow doctors to kill patients, we will not be able to limit the killing to those who want to die.

Present law has a process to ascertain whether or not a patient is in a persistent vegetative state, and it should not matter what politicians think.

The patient's autonomy always, always should be respected, even if it is absolutely contrary - the decision is contrary to best medical advice and what the physician wants.

We should at least make sure that patients are given the opportunity to opt out of spending their final days in a hospital, hooked up to tubes and running up enormous bills.

I hope that when the time comes, I am treated with compassion and allowed to pass on to the next phase of life's journey in the manner of my choice.

Patients who are being kept alive by technology and want to end their lives already have a recognized constitutional right to stop any and all medical interventions, from respirators to antibiotics. They do not need physician-assisted suicide or euthanasia.

It's not about the money. This is about Terri. It's not about the Schindlers, it's not about the legislators, it's not about me, it's about what Terri Schiavo wanted.

Euthanasia and assisted suicide are never acceptable acts of mercy. They always gravely exploit the suffering and desperate, extinguishing life in the name of the 'quality of life' itself.

The laws are still very unclear. Cells are still taken from people without consent - a lot of people don't realize it.

Who shall decide when doctors disagree?

By the very act of arguing, you awake the patient's reason; and once it is awake, who can foresee the result?

If you like the health insurance that you have you should be able to keep it, but if you don't like the health insurance you have, you should be able to choose something else.

Every morning I woke in dread, waiting for the day nurse to go on her rounds and announce from the list of names in her hand whether or not I was for shock treatment, the new and fashionable means of quieting people and of making them realize that orders are to be obeyed and floors are to be polished without anyone protesting and faces are to be made to be fixed into smiles and weeping is a crime.

By offering individuals ownership and control of their health care coverage, we return control to the patients; and that is exactly where it should be.

Residents of my district continue to stress to me that they want health care decisions to be made by patients and doctors, not by the government and insurance companies.

Congress would make it mandatory, absolutely require, that, every five years, people in Medicare have a required counseling session that will tell them how to end their life sooner

We could move catalog, if he'd only die quicker.

Brain surgery couldn't happen without the patient's own active voice to guide the work. The patient is part of the surgical team here, perhaps the most important part, and above all, that's what makes neurosurgery different.

The need is to recognize that The patient is the healer, Not the doctor.

As my mentor in Medical School, Dr William Strong taught me: Never wear a white coat; it separates you from a fellow human being. I never have from that day on. You are your patients guide, counselor, and defender, not their ruler and dictator.

As an OB-GYN physician, I understand the importance of protecting Americans from sexually transmitted diseases, and I applaud the development of an HPV vaccine. But for states to mandate vaccination for young women is both unprecedented and unacceptable.

Michelle and I don't want anyone telling us who our family's doctor should be - and no one should decide that for you either. Under our proposals, if you like your doctor, you keep your doctor. If you like your current insurance, you keep that insurance. Period, end of story.