Dr.michael.benjamin

Revision as of 11:35, 9 December 2007

Revision as of 02:43, 13 December 2007

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:''Theresa Marie "Terri" Schiavo (December 3, 1963 – March 31, 2005) was a woman from St. Petersburg, Florida whose unusual medical and family circumstances and attendant legal battles fueled intense media attention and led to several high-profile court decisions and involvement by prominent politicians and interest groups.''

Note the vague "unusual medical and family circumstances" rather than saying that she was profoundly brain damaged. This compromise was due to the influence of right-to-lifers (really, what they are is anti-euthanasia, but I do not might using that term because they are also anti-abortion-rights). I supposed the stable result of Wikipedia is supposed to be "a compromise", but most people trying to read this were put off right from the start. See [Wikipedia:Peer review/Terri Schiavo]] for some of the feedback. I still say that the complex intermingling of non-notable (1998-2002) legal/medical discovery and wrangling could be quickly summarized and the reader would lose little of the crux of the matter so long as a decent prognosis was presented. If you think about it, when the reader asks "how does this apply to my family?", the "new information" is almost all legal. By that I mean, the reader is going to learn little about how to avoid this sort of cardiac arrest in a family member by reading this story. If a family member does suffer profound brain damage, then the typical American hospital team will be able to reliably inform the relatives when there is little hope of recovery. Where this article comes into play is after the medical damage is done and the family is faced with the legal issue of life-support termination. Then it becomes a legal, social and perhaps religious issue. Well, at least the introduction now is easier to understand and covers only the high-priority issues. If you look back though the talk pages, you will see that a lot of wrangling between the right-to-lifers and others was over minute wording. Note how the wording is still that she had "a diagnosis of persistent vegetative state" rather than bold stating simply that she was in "a persistent vegetative state". The difference is that the former focuses on the physician and that latter focus on the patient. The reason to do that is to insert doubt in the mind of the reader about the diagnosis. The same goes for the focus on Michael Schiavo. If you read "Silent Witness", you will see that the author, [[Mark Fuhrman]] is persistently trying to suggest that Michael Schiavo violently caused his wife's cardiac arrest. You will find that same level of logic in the EM story: focus on the male in insinuate that he is to blame. In both cases, we will never know for sure, but we do ask the courts to resolve the matter. In Schiavo's case, there was a seven year delay in carrying out his will. In Foretich's (EM's husband) case, he also went through many years of trying to clear his name. Both succeeded in the end, but the U.S. Congress changed the law in both cases when the existing law would have resolved the matter adequately. Well, Morgan case is different because she fled the jurisdiction, but I think that the lesson to take away from both cases is that the legislature should be discouraged from attempting to resolve ongoing court cases via new legislation. I am bolding assuming that you have no religious agenda on these matters and can separate the medical and legal aspects well. So in the end, here at Wikipedia, the TS story was, in some ways, held hostage by the right-to-lifers and the EM story croaked because of a lack of popularity. But both are notable and deserve to be done with balance (NPOV, if you will) and with clear, well-written prose. But first, you have to figure out priorities. Both are complicated enough were they can be written NPOV but still be unbalanced in terms of what facts and factual details are included. If they are written by committee (as that former first sentence was), then you will just end up with a bunch of clauses rather than a coherent narrative.--[[User:Laughitup2|Laughitup2]] ([[User talk:Laughitup2|talk]]) 09:42, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

::Thanks for that thoughtful response. I personally believe in euthanasia, but I think it's good that an article is edited in a way that is sensitive to the "other side." I think the introduction strikes a decent tone, and I agree that there were certainly unusual family and medical circumstances that ignited a storm of media and society interest. I think the episode is a good way to get people talking about end-of-life, but it's not necessarily a resource for people searching for the right answer for their particular end-of-life issue, as you propose. Also, "persistent vegetative state" is not a really solid diagnosis for anything in my mind, because it deals with a [[syndrome]], not an [[etiology]]. Anytime we describe a medical condition by its manifestations only (arthritis) rather than the etiologic agent (pneumococcal pneumonia, for example), we are dealing with an uncertain entity. You are entitled to think that the TS article is better without the legalistic details; I think that's part of what makes the whole story so fascinating. As a doctor, I feel validated that the system worked to uphold the sanctity of my professional assessment. Let no legal body regulate my practice. The details of the story then are confirmation that the courts will generally uphold my medical judgement, though the legislature or executive bodies may try to modify that. HTH.--[[User:Dr.michael.benjamin|Dr.michael.benjamin]] ([[User talk:Dr.michael.benjamin#top|talk]]) 02:43, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

== TTP ==