Abstract Appeal — by Matt Conigliaro

THE TERRI SCHIAVO INFORMATION PAGE
As a Florida law blogger, I have created this page to help people understand the legal circumstances surrounding the Terri Schiavo saga. In my view, there continues to be a need for an objective look at the matter. There is an unbelievable amount of misinformation being circulated.

[via NewMexiKen]

Background: Terry Schiavo’s Right To Live or Die By Andrew Somers, Your Guide To Civil Liberty

Death and Dying II
Lawrence Schneiderman, M.D.
Bioethicist, University of California, San Diego

If you allow patients to die without being given glucose or other sources of carbohydrates, they then begin to use their protein and fat as energy sources. This creates ketones, a chemical in the body that seems to have an analgesic effect. More than that, metabolic acidosis seems to have a euphoric effect. A professor of English, a friend of mine, called me one day, and said that her mother was dying of cancer in a nursing home, and there was a big fight in the family about whether or not to put a feeding tube in her in her last week so that she would live longer. In talking with my friend, I strongly urged against putting in what we call a peg tube, a subcutaneous feeding tube. About a month or so later, she called me and said she was so grateful. Her mother died, she said, an ecstatic death. She had this wonderful kind of peaceful, serene vision that accompanied her dying days. And it occurred to me that that’s what we have been depriving modern patients of, that possibility, by insisting on replenishing their food and fluids.