Ethical End-of-Life Decisions
Case Study: Mr. Martinez
Mr. Martinez was a seventy-five-year-old chronic obstructive pulmonary disease patient. He was in the hospital because of an upper respiratory tract infection. He and his wife had requested that CPR not be performed should he require it. A DNR order was written in the charts. In his room on the third floor, he was being maintained with antibiotics, fluids, and oxygen and seemed to be doing better. However, Mr. Martinez’s oxygen was inadvertently turned up, and this caused him to go into respiratory failure. When found by the therapist, he was in terrible distress and lay gasping in his bed.
In a 2–3 page analysis of the case study, address the following:
· The patient’s directives.
· The patient’s quality of life.
· The family’s stated preferences.
· The moral issues associated with limiting life support.
· The ethical principles most relevant to reaching an ethically sound decision.
· Important considerations such as implications, justifications, and any conflicts of interest that might arise because of the patient’s respiratory failure.
When writing your assessment submission assume that doctors cannot contact Mrs. Martinez and must make this choice on their own. To help you reach an objective, ethically sound decision, draw upon concepts and arguments from the suggested resources or your independent research. Support your response with clear, concise, and correct examples, weaving and citing the readings and media throughout your answer
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Ethical End-of-Life Decisions
Ethical End-of-Life Decisions: Case Analysis of Mr. Martinez
Patient’s Directives
Mr. Martinez, a 75-year-old patient with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), had clearly stated, along with his wife, that he did not want cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) performed in the event of a medical emergency. This directive was formally documented as a Do Not Resuscitate (DNR) order in his medical chart. In healthcare ethics, respecting a patient’s directives is fundamental to honoring patient autonomy, which is the right of individuals to make informed decisions about their own care…