Search

Many groups (healthcare professionals, lawyers, philosophers, non-governmental organisations, bioethics committees, journalists, religious groups, etc.) participate in the bioethical debate about medical assistance in dying (MAiD). Bioethics literature on the topic involve different approaches (analytic, empirical, policy oriented, activist) and various normative perspectives (discourses based on deontological premises as the sanctity of life and human dignity, or on utilitarianism, libertarianism, etc.), some of which are at times irreconcilable. Regarding empirical studies, some voices (e.g., healthcare professionals) have been widely considered but the voice of people who request MAiD has been neglected. Understanding the personal and medical circumstances that lead to MAiD, which can only be achieved by listening to the phenomenological discourse of those involved, is key. This study aims to provide knowledge from the testimonies and experiences of patients who have initiated a MAiD request. We believe this research protocol can increase our understanding of a social and academic controversy that lacks important information to be complete. By doing so, this type of research could inform and improve end-of-life public policies, and particularly the health care of individuals who request a MAiD. We propose a qualitative phenomenological study using semi-structured interviews of people in the process of requesting MAiD, as outlined in the Ley Orgánica 3/2021, de regulación de la eutanasia (LORE), the Spanish Law on the Regulation of Euthanasia. The study is conducted nationally using a convenience sampling. The number of interviews is determined sequentially and cumulatively, depending on the richness of the narratives and the saturation of the information that has been collected. For the purposes of analysis, the interviews are transcribed verbatim and pseudonymised afterwards. Data analysis is conducted at the same time as data collection. The proposed study has received a favourable report from the Coordinating Committee on Biomedical Research Ethics of Andalusia (CCEIBA). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Theorists of the ethics and politics of care, with their feminist and intersectional analyses, have spent decades trying to leave their mark on clinical practice and political structures . In them, extensive processes of humanization of the relationship between professionals and people who need their care are required, without neglecting inequalities due to gender, social class or belonging to vulnerable minority groups that go through health and disease experiences in the community. society. It is evident that our institutions must be extensively rethought in their foundations; from nursing homes to highly technological ICUs; from the saturation of primary care to the lack of specialized personnel. In areas such as nursing, great emphasis is placed on models based on interdependence and the particular context to generate another care framework , while fighting for hierarchies and invisibilities related to highly feminized professions . Not surprisingly, the reflections that follow are signed by three women with hybrid profiles who have dedicated part of our working life to the field of primary and hospital care (both in nursing and in physiotherapy) and, in turn, to research and teaching in bioethics, philosophy and humanities. We have experienced in our flesh the contradictions between a will to serve and some axes of oppression connatural to the institutions.