Contemporary Importance of Health Care Proxies
Health care proxies have become increasingly important today due to conflicts among relatives of the primary individual. The Terri Schiavo case is a famous modern-day example. Doctors tried to treat Schiavo for more than ten years and concluded that she was in a persistent vegetative state. Her husband, who stood to benefit financially from not having to divorce Schiavo and who wanted to re-marry, elected to have her feeding tube removed, but her parents objected. This resulted in a lengthy court battle that raised many political, moral, and medical issues. The whole controversy might have been avoided if Schiavo had assigned either her parents or her husband as her health care proxy. As a result, some commentators have argued that health care proxies should be made mandatory.
Read more about this topic: Health Care Proxy
Famous quotes containing the words contemporary, importance, health and/or care:
“That nameless and infinitely delicate aroma of inexpressible tenderness and attentiveness which, in every refined and honorable attachment, is contemporary with the courtship, and precedes the final banns and the rite; but which, like the bouquet of the costliest German wines, too often evaporates upon pouring love out to drink, in the disenchanting glasses of the matrimonial days and nights.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“A man’s personal defects will commonly have with the rest of the world precisely that importance which they have to himself. If he makes light of them, so will other men.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“But from the good health of the mind comes that which is dear to all and the object of prayer—happiness.”
—Aeschylus (525–456 B.C.)
“The American grips himself, at the very sources of his consciousness, in a grip of care: and then, to so much of the rest of life, is indifferent. Whereas, the European hasn’t got so much care in him, so he cares much more for life and living.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)