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The ethical validity and clinical experience of palliative sedation
1VA Medical Center, Phoenix, Ariz. 85310, USA. PalliativeDoctor@aol.com
Mayo Clinic Proceedings
|October 21, 2000
Abstract:
The physician's main goal in caring for a dying person is to reduce suffering, including pain, physical symptoms, and emotional, psychosocial, and spiritual distress. In refractory and intractable cases, palliative sedation offers a compassionate and humane alternative to conscious and continual suffering, both for the patient and the patient's family. Without a doubt, further studies are necessary, particularly in cases of cognitive impairment, but palliative sedation offers a valuable and efficacious intervention for interminable suffering at the end of life.
Keywords:
Death and Euthanasia