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The Liverpool Care Pathway (LCP), Euthanasia and the

Green Party
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 17/04/2015 - 6:33am
The Liverpool Care Pathway (LCP), Euthanasia and the Green Party
Considering that the Green Party in Victoria, Australia, are aiming to have the Law Reform Commission investigate legislation for voluntary euthanasia
(April 2015) the following history of the LCP (Liverpool Care Pathway), is pertinent. The LCP (Liverpool Care Pathway) was implemented in the United
Kingdom, purportedly to make the lives of those who were terminally ill more comfortable. However, reports in the main stream media with respect to the
numbers who were put on this, without terminal illnesses, were worrying (to say the least), and described as horrifying in one Daily Mail article:
Daily Mail October 15, 2012: Care? No, this is a pathway to killing people that doctors deem worthless Horrifyingly, the LCP has become a selffulfilling prophecy. When people are put on it, they are said to be dying. But they may not be dying at all not, that is, until they are put on the
pathway, whereupon they really do die as a result. [ 1 ]
Other mainstream media articles about the Liverpool Care Pathway (LCP) include:
Daily Mail 20 June 2012:NHS hospitals are using end-of-life care to help elderly patients to die because they are difficult to look after and take up
valuable beds, a top doctor has warned. "Predicting death in a time frame of three to four days, or even at any other specific time, is not possible
scientifically. This determination in the LCP leads to a self-fulfilling prophecy. Professor Pullicino said he believed the LCP was being used as an
"assisted death pathway" with patients placed on the LCP without clear evidence. [ 2 ]
New American 20 June 2012: Doctors are supposed to identify a patient who is bound to die in the near future. The plan then can include withdrawal
of treatment, including the provision of water and nourishment by tube. Patients are typically heavily sedated. [ 3 ]
The Telegraph: October 30 2012: NHS millions for controversial care pathway The majority of NHS hospitals in England are being given financial
rewards for placing terminally-ill patients on a controversial pathway to death, it can be disclosed. [ 4 ]
The Daily Mail: July 15 2013: Families were not told their loved ones were on the 'pathway' to death [ 5 ]
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) in the United Kingdom (London) is responsible for guidelines regarding end of life care.
The NHS is legally obliged to provide funding for medicines and treatments recommended by NICEs board. [ 6 ] The NICE (National Institute for Clinical
Excellence) Quality standard for end of life care for adults,NICE quality standard [QS13 ][ 7 ]
NICE (National Institute for Clinical Excellence) also advises on and teaching sex in primary schools. In June 2010, the National Institute for Health and
Clinical Excellence produced draft guidance for schools recommending that children as young as five should be given sex and relationships education. [
8]
The National Institute of Clinical Excellence was previously located at 11 Strand, London (hence of the John Adam St Gang, also known as the
Committee of 300, or the Olympians). [ 9 ]
The LCP was scrapped [10] after investigated by Baroness Neuberger (House of Lords in the United Kingdom). However, Baroness Julia Neuberger is
involved in mandating behaviour change in the UK [11], often implemented via fines. Her brother-in-law David Neuberger is president of the Supreme
Court in the United Kingdom. [12 ]
The Telegraph reported that the LCP program was merely rebranded: The discredited Liverpool Care Pathway is to be rebranded rather than
abolished, senior doctors have said....doctors who led criticism of the pathway say new draft guidance, seen by the Daily Telegraph, outlining a
replacement scheme will perpetuate many of its worst practices... [ 13 ]
Considering that the Green Party in Victoria, Australia, is now keen to have the Law Reform Commission consider legislation for euthanasia, (April
2015) such treatment as the Liverpool Care Pathway for the elderly (who are not ill) may not have gone very far away. A Greens bid to get Victoria's
Law Reform Commission to examine euthanasia has been delayed. Party leaders in the state's upper house agreed to not to vote on the motion after it
looked like it would fail. But the Greens say a vote will be held in May on whether the commission should report on euthanasia laws. [14]
References:
[1] https://www.scribd.com/doc/261907764/021-LCP-Liverpool-Care-Pathway-A-Pa...
[2] https://www.scribd.com/doc/261940807/023-LCP-Elderly-Patients-Helped-to-...
[3] https://www.scribd.com/doc/261940814/024-LCP-Doctor-British-Health-Servi...
[4] https://www.scribd.com/025-LCP-NHS-Millions-for-Controversial-Care-Pathw...
[5] https://www.scribd.com/doc/261946605/028-LCP-Scrapped-Daily-Mail
[6] https://www.scribd.com/doc/262021514/042-National-Institute-for-Health-a...
[7] https://www.scribd.com/doc/261946566/027-LCP-and-National-Institute-for-...
[8] https://www.scribd.com/doc/262078913/585-NICE-National-Institute-for-Cli...
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[9] www.youtube.com/watch?v=zyqsOBkLWh0
[10] https://www.scribd.com/doc/261946605/028-LCP-Scrapped-Daily-Mail
[11] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPAAMazmmqU
[12] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Neuberger,_Baron_Neuberger_of_Abbotsbury
[13] https://www.scribd.com/doc/262086153/044-lcp-liverpool-care-pathway-bein...
[14] https://www.scribd.com/doc/261951515/030-Victoria-Euthanasia-Law-Bid-Del...
Keywords:
LCP,Liverpool Care Pathway,Green Party Victoria Australia,euthanasia,aged care facilities,Australia 21,Leading Age Services Australia
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The LIverpool Care Pathway in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Permalink Submitted by anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 17/04/2015 - 3:49pm
Quote from the above article:
Considering that the Green Party in Victoria, Australia, is now keen to have the Law Reform Commission consider legislation for euthanasia, (April
2015) such treatment as the Liverpool Care Pathway for the elderly (who are not ill) may not have gone very far away.
The LCP is certainly not very far away at all.
Although the LCP (Liverpool Care Pathway) was scrapped in the UK (Daily Mail, 15 July 2013 [1] ) it was stated in the Daily Mail December 2013 that it
was being rebranded rather than axed. [2]
St Vincents, Collaborative Centre of the University of Melbourne, and Centre for Palliative Care produced a report May 2011, titled LCP: End of Life
Care and Care Pathways in Victoria Report and Recommendations. Funded by the Department of Health Victoria. [3]
It states:
Liverpool Care Pathway
The Liverpool Care Pathway (LCP) is the most widely used end of life care pathway internationally. The majority of end of life
care pathways
and integrated care pathways in use throughout Victoria are approved modifications of the LCP or a version of the LCP. The LCP is the recommended
best practice model by the Department of Health in the UK. The LCP undergoes a rigorous process of ongoing improvement and development including
comprehensive audits and a dedicated research program. The LCP has been implemented into hospitals, residential care homes, hospices, and in the
individuals own home / community. The most recent version, Version 12 was developed as part of a two year consultation exercise with UK hospitals.
Version 12 is now available. The ethos in this and previous iterations has not changed since its initial inception in 1994
References:
[1] https://www.scribd.com/doc/261946605/028-LCP-Liverpool-Care-Pathway-Scra...
[2] https://www.scribd.com/doc/262086153/044-lcp-liverpool-care-pathway-bein...
[3] https://www.scribd.com/doc/262094937/045-LCP-End-of-Life-Care-and-Care-P...

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A lot of things to consider

Permalink Submitted by Pyewacket on Sat, 18/04/2015 - 12:17pm
For centuries doctors have been giving dying patients overdoses of morphine and other drugs which incidentally result in their deaths while being
necessary to relieve pain. No doctors are being prosecuted for this, and rightly so. I saw this happening in Port Kembla palliative care ward while my
uncle was there. The staff do a great job of helping people to die pain-free, and weeks before they might have died if nature took its horrible course. I
think until all these potential problems are thought through, decriminalization might be the way to go. On the other hand a few years back Bulli hospital
doctors decided my 98 year old grandfather, who'd only suffered a minor fall, should be euthanased. They described to me exactly how they would do
this by sending him to Palliative Care and withdrawing food and water. They had already stopped feeding him and he was telling me he was hungry and
wanted a cup of tea. I informed these doctors in no uncertain terms that I would be reporting them to the Coroner and they'd be answering some very
difficult questions. I told them to get him some food and a cup of tea immediately and remove the drip in his arm. Amazingly, though I was not officially
'next of kin', this was done within minutes and one happy grandfather went back home. He always wanted to live to 100 and he did so, dying a few days
before his 101st birthday.
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