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      Merits, Demands, and Challenges of VSED.

      Narrative inquiry in bioethics
      Project Muse

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          Abstract

          VSED demands willful determination from those who do it. The requisite willfulness is an ethical strength, providing greater assurance of voluntariness. Dying by VSED has another major merit: its pace provides time for the person and loved ones to embrace death in a shared appreciation of life. Support from professional caregivers is important in making dying by VSED comfortable. If acknowledged by its providers, this need for professional support has ancillary benefits: accurate information is more likely to be communicated to patients, and professional caregivers help normalize VSED and minimize abuses. VSED faces a moral challenge when it is categorized as suicide. In an obvious sense, VSED is suicide: the person's intention is to die, and the means employed assuredly causes death. Being a form of suicide does not imply that VSED is morally impermissible. Pursued to hasten death in a last stage of life, it is a response to "terminal" situations. This contributes greatly to VSED's moral acceptability when perceived as suicide.

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          Author and article information

          Journal
          Narrat Inq Bioeth
          Narrative inquiry in bioethics
          Project Muse
          2157-1740
          2157-1740
          2016
          : 6
          : 2
          Article
          S2157174016200146
          10.1353/nib.2016.0029
          27763401
          5ea9ad0f-2936-4d5f-a305-719ec0533f75
          History

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