OUR POSITION ON MEDICALLY ASSISTED DEATH

Patients Canada fully supports the right of patients to seek Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID), a right guaranteed for all Canadians, under federal and provincial legislation, currently in place.

Patients Canada is committed to listening to, respecting, encouraging, and championing the patient voice and experience in the on-going national debate on the present state and future direction of our national health care system.

Nowhere is it more important to consider the patient’s rights, responsibilities, equity of access than the decision to seek Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID), the most important decision that any person will have to make in their lives.

Patients Canada does not think that MAID is the most appropriate decision for all people as they approach the end of their lives. MAID is the best alternative for seeking assistance in dying for those patients who have lost the will to live, see no further purpose in living and wish to bring an end to their lives at a time, place, and circumstances of their own choosing, with all of the medical and emotional supports necessary.

Our Recommendations

Further to this federal and provincial guarantee of the patient’s access to Medical Assistance in Death (MAID), Patients Canada is asking for the following procedural clarifications, on behalf of patients and caregivers:

• Provincial Ministries of Health must provide a free standing, autonomous, objective, ethically and professionally supported process and procedures for considering and making decisions on applications from patients for Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID). This process and procedures must be implemented in a decentralized manner in communities throughout the province so as ensure that all patients enjoy equal, free, and transparent access so as ensure that confidentiality and mutual respect are guaranteed for all concerned in this most difficult decision.

• The federal and provincial governments must guarantee the patient’s right to Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) by: a) proactively communicating the essentials of MAID as an integral part of the offer of services offered by the health care delivery system; b) raising public awareness and understanding of the essential elements of MAID; c) protecting the individual patients from well intentioned yet inappropriate interference by family members, medical professionals, legal profession, special interest groups, the community at large in an effort to deny the patient access to MAID.

• The federal government should define a small Committee of Experts, representatives of the communities of patients, medical profession, legal profession, faith communities, to act as the ultimate decision making authority on decisions on eligibility for Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID). Because of the complexity of the issues and the intensity of emotions, the great personal and professional ramifications of this MAID decision, it is essential that the patient must have a ‘court of last resort’, free standing, autonomous, easily accessible, prompt in responding to the patient in their hour of greatest need.

• The federal and provincial governments should immediately address the concerns of patients with life threatening illness, involving increasing degrees of cognitive impairment to ensure their access to Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID). Government authorities should implement policies and procedures for decision making and application for MAID while the patient is still of sound mind, as well as establishment of advanced directives, agreement on substitute decision maker/caregiver, definition of symptoms and treatment benchmarks which would allow for renewal of the application for MAID, (the patient being no longer capable of decision making, due to cognitive impairment). fulfillment of the patients wishes for MAID, though they are no longer able to make the decision nor act on their own behalf.

Download the PDF of the PATIENTS CANADA STATEMENT ON DOCTOR ASSISTED DYING