posted April 08, 2020 07:13 PM            

Coronavirus: Doctors Pressuring Senior Citizens to Sign Do Not Resuscitate Forms
Victoria Friedman
8 Apr 2020

Charities have condemned reports that doctors are pressuring senior citizens into signing do not resuscitate (DNR) forms.

Age UK, Independent Age, and other charities and regional organisations have condemned reports of shocking examples of older, vulnerable, and critically ill people who have felt pressurised into signing Do Not Attempt CPR forms.

The letter signed on Monday continued: Alongside this, many of the people affected have experienced fear and anxiety, and feel that their lives and wishes do not matter. This is shameful and unacceptable.

Whether or not to sign a DNA-CPR form is an individual's decision, and they have a right to make that decision without feeling pressurised, the charities said.

posted April 09, 2020 01:12 PM            

A ventilator can help patients unable to breathe on their own, but the experience of COVID-19 patients has been sobering for doctors.

Most coronavirus patients who end up on ventilators go on to die, according to several small studies from the U.S., China and Europe.

And many of the patients who continue to live can't be taken off the mechanical breathing machines.

"It's very concerning to see how many patients who require ventilation do not make it out of the hospital," says Dr. Tiffany Osborn, a critical care specialist at Washington University in St. Louis who has been caring for coronavirus patients at Barnes-Jewish Hospital.

That concern is echoed by Negin Hajizadeh, a pulmonary critical care doctor at the Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell on Long Island, N.Y.

"We have had several patients between the hospitals across the Northwell system that have come off the breathing machine," Hajizadeh says. "But the vast majority are unable to."

The largest study so far to look at mortality among coronavirus patients on ventilators was done by the Intensive Care National Audit & Research Centre in London. It found that among 98 ventilated patients in the U.K., just 33 were discharged alive.

The numbers from a study of Wuhan, China, are even grimmer. Only 3 of 22 ventilated patients survived.

And a study of 18 ventilated patients in Washington state found that nine were still alive when the study ended, but only six had recovered enough to breathe on their own.

All the early research suggests that once coronavirus patients are placed on a ventilator, they will probably need to stay on it for weeks. And the longer patients remain on a breathing machine, the more likely they are to die........