Sorry Jody - I'm way behind with emails and only saw your question today - I'm imagining you would have liked a faster answer, and want to suggest that you add my name to the subject line if you want me to notice something.
You wrote: > Mike - this raised my curiosity. We certainly have doctors in the US who > would, as you say, Not investigate thoroughly in thei instance. However, I am > wondering if there are any guidelines in the UK stating that certain treatments > may not be pursued for clients over a certain age. My Mother has a friend in > Denmark. The friend's father recently died from cancer. He was given no > treatment other than palliative. My Mom's friend states that they do not use > chemo, radiation, or surgery for cancer in patients over 65. Suzanne, is this > true? Certainly not! Although discrimination because of age is still legal here, in certain fields (like job access), medical treatment is not one of them! I happen to know, though, that chemo for lung cancer is often not recommended for very old people because their other organs will not tolerate it - this may be the case for other types of cancer too. My own mother, who's 83, will be starting radiation therapy next week........ Other non US OTs, does your health system have any such guidelines? If > so, do you agree that chemo, radiation, & surgery for CA patiens over 65 is > futile? To me, it seems wrong to deny chemo, radiation, surgery for all CA > patiens over 65. In some cases, depending on the overall health of the person, I > agree that the care may be futile, but a blanket rule to that effect seems > wrong to me. It feels like discrimination against elders. Yeps - that would be direct discrimination. Indirect discrimination is a more usual problem here - like: One thing I've often noticed is, when someone has a stroke they're much more likely to be admitted to a special neurologic hospital unit, if they're young - while the elderly are often placed in general medical units. While they might still get the same tests, scannings, medical attention - be seen by a neurologist, get OT and PT etc - the nursing will not be as geared towards their needs, and both survival and functional outcome is known to suffer - this has been shown in recent research. Lack of capacity is the culprit - and as long as this isn't solved, old people are more likely to recieve less optimal treatment as they don't have jobs, little kids etc to put them first in line for the optimal treatment, placement, waiting lists etc. Just my 2 euro cents, I guess (-: susanne, denmark - also wanting to say happy newyear to all of you!! _______________________________________________ To unsubscribe, visit: http://otnow.com/mailman/listinfo/otlist_otnow.com The OTnow Mail Archive: www.mail-archive.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED] ===============================================
