Individuals have right to die
Burlington Free Press, February 5, 2007

I first heard a patient with advanced ovarian cancer plead with me to help her die when I was a young doctor at the Mary Fletcher Hospital a third of a century ago.

Since then, I have devoted my professional life to the diagnosis, care, treatment, research and teaching about women with gynecological cancer.

The majority are cured, but those who are not need uniquely special care for themselves and those close to them. Reduction in suffering, emotional support, helping loved ones cope and grieve, assistance with bills, home and hospice care -- such care is vital to our oncology patients, our state, and society.

There can be real patient suffering -- pain, weight loss, weakness, shortness of breath, bowel and bladder dysfunction, fluid collections and worse.

Some patients -- loving, kind, caring, incredibly special wives, sister, daughters, people, women -- have continued to ask me over the years what the patient at Mary Fletcher pleaded for in the early 1970s: help for ending her life, her way, at her time.

Such a personal decision may be uncommon, perhaps even rare, but every individual has the right to die in the presence of incurable disease. It's her life.

JACKSON B. BEECHAM, M.D.
Strafford