Gov. Jerry Brown signed the End of Life Option Act in October 2015, and the law went into effect on June 9, 2016.
But for many Coachella Valley residents who have been diagnosed with a terminal illness and given a prognosis of less than six months to live, the end-of-life option remains out of grasp—that is, unless they switch health providers.
Trust me, I know: I helped my mother-in-law through the end-of-life process last year.
No statistics are available yet regarding the number of Coachella Valley patients who have obtained prescriptions for life-ending medications since the law took effect; the initial annual report required by the law will not be issued until later this year. But according to patient, doctor and advocate feedback, the refusal of some major health-care providers in our valley to support the new law has been keeping those numbers down. Eisenhower Medical Center (EMC), with facilities located across the valley, and both Desert Regional Medical Center in Palm Springs and JFK Memorial Hospital in Indio (the latter two owned by Tenet Health, a company based in Dallas) have been refusing assistance to terminally ill patients.
However, this picture improved in mid-February, when Tenet Health informed Compassion and Choices—a national nonprofit “medical aid in dying” advocacy organization—that the company had established a “regulatory compliance policy to define the scope of permitted participation, documentation and notification requirements for Tenet entities” in California.
Compassion and Choices California director Matt Whitaker welcomed the news.
“Tenet confirmed that their physicians are indeed allowed to participate in the (End of Life Option) act,” Whitaker wrote the Independent in an email.
Curiously, the written policy just delivered by Tenet was dated June 7, 2016. What could have caused the eight-month communication delay?
“The good news is that they (Tenet) are going to allow individuals to have access to medical aid in dying,” said Joe Barnes, the Compassion and Choices California outreach manager, during a recent phone interview. “It sounds like they are probably still having challenges about whether or not to allow people who are being treated in their hospitals to be able to be in a private hospital room surrounded by loved ones and ingest the medication to end their pain and suffering.”
Barnes said many health-care organizations are still figuring out the logistics of dealing with the new law.
“It seems some health-care systems are still working out the internal mechanics of how they are addressing the needs of their patients,” he said. “Sometimes, one side of the hospital is not communicating with the other side, and then the patient doesn’t receive the correct information. But we try to follow up with health-care systems to see what their questions might be if they have any, and also to find out what their official policy is. If a health-care system doesn’t have a written policy, then they are automatically considered a supportive health-care system.”
While Tenet is taking steps toward assisting patients with the law, EMC is apparently not. I contacted Lee Rice, the media coordinator and public relations specialist at EMC, to talk with an appropriate representative regarding the End of Life Option Act. After several days, Rice replied that no interview could be arranged. He did, however, forward to me an official statement, which read, in part: “Eisenhower Medical Center carefully reviewed and discussed the requirements of the End of Life Option Act and elected the option under the act not to participate in the process. … Eisenhower will provide information about the End of Life Option Act upon request and supports each patient’s right to make decisions about care, including the choice to accept or reject treatments that might be available.”
Compassion and Choices’ Whitaker expressed disappointment with EMC’s stance.
“We would characterize Tenet’s policy as supportive, but not Eisenhower’s,” Whitaker said. “The line that (Eisenhower representatives) keep using is that their physicians are free to do this on their own time. That’s the framing they use to say that they’re not limiting access for patients in the area: ‘We (EMC) are only limiting it during the time that they’re employed by us.’ But the way that health care has consolidated, EMC has 40-something clinics that have affiliated with them in the area, so there are not a lot of sole practitioners out there—and for folks who work in a hospital or an outpatient clinic, they don’t really have the ability to do things on their own time. They don’t have their own medical-records system. Oftentimes, their malpractice insurance is through their employer. They don’t have the physical facilities available to care for these patients. So (EMC) is kind of a broken record when they just keep pushing back, saying, ‘Well, the doctors can do it on their own time.’ That’s not what’s needed. Patients who are being seen by doctors at these clinics need to be able to receive this treatment during the course of their care.”
In an effort to influence EMC’s stance, Compassion and Choices supporters and other valley residents are planning a rally at 11 a.m., Thursday, March 2, in front of the main Eisenhower Medical Center campus in Rancho Mirage.
“Ever since Eisenhower Medical Center announced that it wasn’t going to allow people to have access to medical aid in dying, there’s been an increase in the requests for presentations to community groups and organizations across the area,” Barnes said. “The question always comes up as to what the community can do, because that’s (one of the) the flagship hospitals in the area.
“We have thousands of people who are supportive of medical aid in dying in that area. They helped us pass the law in the first place by reaching out to their local legislators and holding events to educate fellow community members to the importance of medical aid in dying. So, the natural next step is that the folks want to have a rally in front of the hospital. Many of the people who will be at the rally are also donors to the Eisenhower (Medical Center) Foundation. They’re kind of scratching their heads, because they live in the community and donate to the hospital but can’t get access to medical aid in dying, and they really don’t understand it.”
Pitfalls in assisted suicide laws need attention. We already have the right to refuse treatment. Many who believe in the concept under the choice banner have second-thoughts org when they read the language of the actual bill and realize our choice is Ignored and certainly not assured.
This is not about people who are dying anyway.
Amending Colorado’s Prop 106 is sorely needed (and OR,WA,CA). The initiative was bought for $8,000,000 of deception. Even as they proclaimed that the poison must be self administered they did not provide for an ordinary witness. The difference is that without a witness it allows forced euthanasia but with a witness they would up hold individual choice.
Amendments would include requiring a witness to the self administration, restore the illegality of falsifying the death certificate require the posting of the poison applied in the medical record for the sake of good stewardship for future studies, register organ/tissue trafficking, reveal commissions and memorials paid to the corporate facilitators and keep all records for transparent public safety policy.
These Oregon model bills do not assure our choice.
Bradley Williams
President
MTaas org