The glossary of the end of life with the Little Brothers of the Poor

​While the work of the citizens’ convention on the end of life is coming to an end, the Little Brothers of the Poor come back, through a small glossary, to the different concepts relating to the end of life as part of their study “Paroles old citizens at the end of life – Little Brothers of the Poor”. An essential point.

• Deep and continuous sedation until death : this consists of putting a person suffering from a serious and incurable disease into deep sleep to relieve or prevent refractory suffering. It is associated with analgesia and the cessation of life-sustaining treatments.

• Palliative care : this is active care delivered in a global approach to the person suffering from a serious, progressive or terminal illness. They can intervene during a period of care or in the advanced phase of an incurable illness. The objective is to relieve physical pain and to take into account psychological, social and spiritual suffering. Palliative care aims to improve the quality of life of sick people. They are likely to intervene regardless of the place of living or care through care that includes the relatives of the sick person.

• Identified palliative care bed : this is a device relating to the health sector. The beds identified as palliative care are located in services which face the end of life or frequent deaths, but whose activity is not exclusively devoted to palliative care. The individualization of identified palliative care beds within a service makes it possible to optimize its organization to provide a more appropriate response to patients who require palliative care and support, as well as to their relatives.

• active assistance in dying : it designates any act whose purpose is to cause the death of a person, at his request, when he is suffering from a serious and incurable disease, in an advanced or terminal phase. Active assistance in dying includes euthanasia and assisted suicide.

• euthanasia : it is the administration by a third party of a lethal substance which causes the death of the person.

• assisted suicide : it is carried out with the prescription by a doctor of a lethal substance that the person obtains in a pharmacy to administer it himself.

Article published on 03/23/2023 at 01:00 | Read 40 times