A Berkeley, Calif.-based physician, Lonny Shavelson, MD, is opening a practice dedicated to patients who seek life-ending medication under the End of Life Option Act. The law goes into effect Thursday, and will enable physician-assisted suicide, according to a report from The Mercury News on Dr. Shavelson's practice.
Dr. Shavelson, an emergency room physician, wrote the 1995 book, A Chosen Death: The Dying Confront Assisted Suicide, which chronicled five terminally ill people who chose to die on their own terms. He said his work on this book made him an advocate of physician-assisted suicide for those patients who, when presented with all the options, would prefer this choice, according to the report.
His practice, Bay Area End of Life Options, will first help patients experience the best-possible end of life care without medication, through hospice or palliative care programs, according to the report. To critics, Dr. Shavelson says the main goal is actually not to prescribe end-of-life drugs for patients, it's to make the palliative experience as positive as possible, according to the report.
However, Dr. Shavelson told The Mercury News, if "it's about [the patient] being 'finished,' and saying 'I don't need the next two weeks of laying here, and my family sitting by my side, and everyone just waiting. I'm done,'" he wants to provide a safe and legal option to assist them.
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