End of Life Care Issues

The projection of patients' life expectancy is of the highest importance to patient's family and health care professionals, particularly in the context of serious disease. Many important health care decisions, suchas those regarding chemotherapy use, hospice referral, advance care planning, discharge planning, and personal finances, are dependent on life-expectancy. The care of patients with incurable illness places a lot of stresson health professionals (both generalist and specialist). The Jewish tradition regards the preservation of human life as one of its supreme moral values and forbids doing anything that might shorten life. However, it does not require doctors to make dying last longer than it naturally would. Christians are mostly against euthanasia. The arguments are usually based on the beliefs that life is given by God, and that human beings are made in God's image. Some churches also emphasise the importance of not interfering with the natural process of death.Islam considers medical ethics the same as ethics in other areas of life. Islamic medical ethics is restating general ethical principles using medical terminology and with medical applications.