Nil by mouth
From Dr Richard Lamerton Sir: Dr Andrew Lawson's letter of 13 January misses the point. It is not people who are terminally ill and imminently dying who are causing increasing public concern. It is people who are not actually dying that it is feared will be given no fluids or food in hospitals.
Dr Lawson's bland reassurances that no doctor would dream of dehydrating patients to death is rather unconvincing when horrified families are reporting cases to the press every week. I can understand his incredulity. Caring doctors would surely not announce that someone with a stroke will soon die, and then put 'nil by mouth' on the bed and let them die of thirst, would they? But the awful fact is that some are doing that.
Dr Lawson used the phrase `the substitution of technology for care', but that is a false dichotomy. Good medicine provides both.
Dr Richard Lamerton Dinedor, Hereford
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