Popularity of Alternative Medicine

Voice and exit are the chosen way to shift the blame to employees1. Voice: foster complaints; call patients customers and tell them they have rights. Exit: facilitate private insurance, advance refusals of treatment (and eventually euthanasia) to reduce the burden on taxpayers. If the customer wants death who are we (paternalistic professionals) to oppose their wishes. Old age is not an epidemic that will pass. Man is mortal and ill-health will eventually come to us all. When the procedure of cardiopulmonary resuscitation was explained to older people, most considered that selective resuscitation was appropriate2. Rather than encourage negative views concerning old age we need to change the culture of care. It is the likelihood of success that should influence our decisions, not the patient's age3. What we plan now will set the scene for the future. The choice is ours assisted death or assisted life.