By Sanitsuda Ekachai, Reader
Email: sanitsudae@bangkokpost.co.th
When I was little, I used to believe that death was inevitable for everyone else except me. Such is the arrogance of childhood.
Now that the person I see in the mirror is a totally different being from that unknowing girl - with each strand of grey hair confirming a step closer to the inevitable - what I fear most is not death itself, but the loss of control over how I die.
That is also one form of arrogance, isn't it?
The right-to-die movement in Thailand does not believe so. That is why they are pushing for a "living will" law so that when we are at death's door, we can die a natural death surrounded by our loved ones instead of being kept in a vegetative state, having our lives artificially prolonged by modern medical technology.
The law and the medical community must respect our right to die with dignity, they insist.
When the draft of the law was debated in a public hearing session in Bangkok last week, the focus on the medical and legal technicalities reflected the medical community's fear for their legal safety, rather than the dying patients' needs for quality care and peaceful departure.
Fear of lawsuits aside, can the medical community's concerns stem from their professional training which makes them see their mission as a war against Death and modern technology as their weapon to conquer Nature?
Or is it just a wariness on the civil society's challenge against the medical community which has long enjoyed the authority to determine which patients should, or could, be saved or not.
I, for one, cannot quite grasp the physicians' fear of breaking the law and medical ethics.
Let's face reality on the ground. When the majority poor still cannot afford proper medical treatment and when scarce budgets go to the ones who can be saved first, isn't it already a common practice for physicians in cash-strapped state hospitals to just let the dying ones go?
Some cynics even suggest the resistance against the living will is mainly a financial one since the life-prolonging operation is mainly a practice in private hospitals where the better-off seek medical care.
If your ailing parent is critically sick and the doctors tell you there are ways that "might" save his/her life, but you must pay for them, what will you do? If you don't take the option, you risk being an ingrate and suffer the guilt of not doing your best to save the life of your parent.
So you keep paying. This exploitation by medical commercialisation has left many families bankrupt.
That is why I will definitely have my living will. Not only because it will save my family from unnecessary guilt and financial bankruptcy, but having an advance directive will also force me to comtemplate on death, my own death.
It will force me to explore ways to help me greet death with calm, how to go without resentment or regrets left, and how to prepare myself for that critical moment through cultivating mindfulness here and now.
The spiritual element is originally the driving force of the draft living will. Unfortunately, this essence has been sidelined as the draft keeps sliding deeper and deeper into legal technicalities.
The living will is not only about filling forms and meeting legal and medical requirements. It is about talking it through with our family about life and death and having a more equal patient-physician relationship.
It is about accepting the limitations of technology, accepting our own mortality, and understanding what constitutes a good death.
It is also about our new outlook on life that frees us from fear and bereavement from death and loss.
Without these elements, our last wish to die with dignity risks being bypassed - living will or not.[rc]
© Copyright 1996-2008 The Post Publishing Public Company Limited
June 5, 2009
THAILAND: A living will that allows us to die in peace
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BANGKOK, Thailand / The Bangkok Post / Opinion / June 5, 2009
By Sanitsuda Ekachai, Reader
Email: sanitsudae@bangkokpost.co.th
When I was little, I used to believe that death was inevitable for everyone else except me. Such is the arrogance of childhood.
Now that the person I see in the mirror is a totally different being from that unknowing girl - with each strand of grey hair confirming a step closer to the inevitable - what I fear most is not death itself, but the loss of control over how I die.
That is also one form of arrogance, isn't it?
The right-to-die movement in Thailand does not believe so. That is why they are pushing for a "living will" law so that when we are at death's door, we can die a natural death surrounded by our loved ones instead of being kept in a vegetative state, having our lives artificially prolonged by modern medical technology.
The law and the medical community must respect our right to die with dignity, they insist.
When the draft of the law was debated in a public hearing session in Bangkok last week, the focus on the medical and legal technicalities reflected the medical community's fear for their legal safety, rather than the dying patients' needs for quality care and peaceful departure.
Fear of lawsuits aside, can the medical community's concerns stem from their professional training which makes them see their mission as a war against Death and modern technology as their weapon to conquer Nature?
Or is it just a wariness on the civil society's challenge against the medical community which has long enjoyed the authority to determine which patients should, or could, be saved or not.
I, for one, cannot quite grasp the physicians' fear of breaking the law and medical ethics.
Let's face reality on the ground. When the majority poor still cannot afford proper medical treatment and when scarce budgets go to the ones who can be saved first, isn't it already a common practice for physicians in cash-strapped state hospitals to just let the dying ones go?
Some cynics even suggest the resistance against the living will is mainly a financial one since the life-prolonging operation is mainly a practice in private hospitals where the better-off seek medical care.
If your ailing parent is critically sick and the doctors tell you there are ways that "might" save his/her life, but you must pay for them, what will you do? If you don't take the option, you risk being an ingrate and suffer the guilt of not doing your best to save the life of your parent.
So you keep paying. This exploitation by medical commercialisation has left many families bankrupt.
That is why I will definitely have my living will. Not only because it will save my family from unnecessary guilt and financial bankruptcy, but having an advance directive will also force me to comtemplate on death, my own death.
It will force me to explore ways to help me greet death with calm, how to go without resentment or regrets left, and how to prepare myself for that critical moment through cultivating mindfulness here and now.
The spiritual element is originally the driving force of the draft living will. Unfortunately, this essence has been sidelined as the draft keeps sliding deeper and deeper into legal technicalities.
The living will is not only about filling forms and meeting legal and medical requirements. It is about talking it through with our family about life and death and having a more equal patient-physician relationship.
It is about accepting the limitations of technology, accepting our own mortality, and understanding what constitutes a good death.
It is also about our new outlook on life that frees us from fear and bereavement from death and loss.
Without these elements, our last wish to die with dignity risks being bypassed - living will or not.[rc]
© Copyright 1996-2008 The Post Publishing Public Company Limited
By Sanitsuda Ekachai, Reader
Email: sanitsudae@bangkokpost.co.th
When I was little, I used to believe that death was inevitable for everyone else except me. Such is the arrogance of childhood.
Now that the person I see in the mirror is a totally different being from that unknowing girl - with each strand of grey hair confirming a step closer to the inevitable - what I fear most is not death itself, but the loss of control over how I die.
That is also one form of arrogance, isn't it?
The right-to-die movement in Thailand does not believe so. That is why they are pushing for a "living will" law so that when we are at death's door, we can die a natural death surrounded by our loved ones instead of being kept in a vegetative state, having our lives artificially prolonged by modern medical technology.
The law and the medical community must respect our right to die with dignity, they insist.
When the draft of the law was debated in a public hearing session in Bangkok last week, the focus on the medical and legal technicalities reflected the medical community's fear for their legal safety, rather than the dying patients' needs for quality care and peaceful departure.
Fear of lawsuits aside, can the medical community's concerns stem from their professional training which makes them see their mission as a war against Death and modern technology as their weapon to conquer Nature?
Or is it just a wariness on the civil society's challenge against the medical community which has long enjoyed the authority to determine which patients should, or could, be saved or not.
I, for one, cannot quite grasp the physicians' fear of breaking the law and medical ethics.
Let's face reality on the ground. When the majority poor still cannot afford proper medical treatment and when scarce budgets go to the ones who can be saved first, isn't it already a common practice for physicians in cash-strapped state hospitals to just let the dying ones go?
Some cynics even suggest the resistance against the living will is mainly a financial one since the life-prolonging operation is mainly a practice in private hospitals where the better-off seek medical care.
If your ailing parent is critically sick and the doctors tell you there are ways that "might" save his/her life, but you must pay for them, what will you do? If you don't take the option, you risk being an ingrate and suffer the guilt of not doing your best to save the life of your parent.
So you keep paying. This exploitation by medical commercialisation has left many families bankrupt.
That is why I will definitely have my living will. Not only because it will save my family from unnecessary guilt and financial bankruptcy, but having an advance directive will also force me to comtemplate on death, my own death.
It will force me to explore ways to help me greet death with calm, how to go without resentment or regrets left, and how to prepare myself for that critical moment through cultivating mindfulness here and now.
The spiritual element is originally the driving force of the draft living will. Unfortunately, this essence has been sidelined as the draft keeps sliding deeper and deeper into legal technicalities.
The living will is not only about filling forms and meeting legal and medical requirements. It is about talking it through with our family about life and death and having a more equal patient-physician relationship.
It is about accepting the limitations of technology, accepting our own mortality, and understanding what constitutes a good death.
It is also about our new outlook on life that frees us from fear and bereavement from death and loss.
Without these elements, our last wish to die with dignity risks being bypassed - living will or not.[rc]
© Copyright 1996-2008 The Post Publishing Public Company Limited
