The Chicago Tribune has an opinion piece today entitled Do not resusictate . . . do not feel remorse. The author describes her mother’s last year of life, struggling with old age and dementia. The mother ultimately dies at home after the family refused to allow a feeding tube. The author also briefly considers how she would have responded to a request by her mother for assisted suicide if that had been legally available.
In 2009 the US Conference of Catholic Bishops approved the 5th edition of Ethical and Religious Directives to Catholic Hospitals and provided more explicit guidance of the omission of artificial nutrition and hydration in paragraph 58.