Euthanasia Simulation

PART 4

In 1975, Karen Ann Quinlan, 21, a New Jersey resident, fell into a coma. She was taken to a local hospital and immediately hooked up to a respirator. She was later diagnosed as being in a persistent vegetative state. Her parents asked the attending physician to disconnect their daughter's respirator, insisting that she would never have wanted to be kept alive in a vegetative state. The attending physician declined the parents' request on the grounds that disconnecting the respirator would be a substantial deviation from medical practices, standards, and traditions.

Mr. Quinlan petitioned the Superior Court of New Jersey to become his daughter's guardian. He asked that he be granted the express power to authorize the discontinuance of all extraordinary means of sustaining the vital processes of his daughter's life. The court refused to grant him the requested relief, holding that "the determination [of] whether or not Karen Ann Quinlan [should] be removed from the respirator is to be left to the treating physician."

Mr. Quinlan filed an appeal with the Supreme Court of New Jersey. In 1976, the supreme court reversed the lower court's decision and granted the relief sought by Karen's father. The supreme court upheld Karen's constitutional "right of privacy". The court held that "[the right of privacy] is broad enough to encompass a patient's decision to decline medical treatment under certain circumstances." "The termination of treatment pursuant to the right of privacy is, within the limitations of this case, ipso facto lawful." The court noted that "the State's interest [in the preservation of life] weakens and the individual's right to privacy grows as the degree of bodily invasion increases and the prognosis dims. Ultimately there comes a point at which the individual's rights overcome the State interest." The court further decided that "Karen's right of privacy may be asserted on her behalf by her guardian under the peculiar circumstances here present" and appointed her father as her guardian, granting him the choice of the attending physician. The court concluded that "Upon the concurrence of the guardian and family of Karen, should the responsible attending physician conclude that there is no reasonable possibility of Karen's ever emerging from her present comatose condition to a cognitive, sapient state and that the life-support apparatus ... should be disconnected, they shall consult with the hospital "Ethics Committee" or like body of the institution in which Karen is then hospitalized. If that consultative body agrees [with the prognosis], the present life-support system may be withdrawn ... without any civil or criminal liability ... on the part of any participant ... " Although Karen was later removed from the respirator, she started to breathe on her own. She remained in a persistent vegetative state without ever regaining consciousness for more than 9 years. Karen died of pneumonia at the age of 31 in 1985.