Although euthanasia has been a pressing ethical and public issue, empirical data are lacking in Japan. We aimed to explore Japanese nurses’ attitudes to patients’ requests for euthanasia and to estimate the proportion of nurses who have taken active steps to hasten death. A postal survey was conducted between October and December 1999 among all nurse members of the Japanese Association of Palliative Medicine, using a self-administered questionnaire based on the one used in a previous survey with Australian nurses in (...) 1991. The response rate was 68%. A total of 53% of the respondents had been asked by patients to hasten their death, but none had taken active steps to bring about death. Only 23% regarded voluntary active euthanasia as something ethically right and 14% would practice it if it were legal. A comparison with empirical data from the previous Australian study suggests a significantly more conservative attitude among Japanese nurses. (shrink)

Objective—To demonstrate Japanese doctors' and nurses' attitudes towards and practices of voluntary euthanasia (VE) and to compare their attitudes and practices in this regard. Design—Postal survey, conducted between October and December 1999, using a self-administered questionnaire.Participants—All doctor members and nurse members of the Japanese Association of Palliative Medicine.Main outcome measure—Doctors' and nurses' attitude towards and practices of VE.Results—We received 366 completed questionnaires from 642 doctors surveyed (response rate, 58%) and 145 from 217 nurses surveyed (68%). A total of 54% (95% (...) confidence interval (CI): 49-59) of the responding doctors and 53% (CI: 45-61) of the responding nurses had been asked by patients to hasten death, of whom 5% (CI: 2-8) of the former and none of the latter had taken active steps to bring about death. Although 88% (CI: 83-92) of the doctors and 85% (CI: 77-93) of the nurses answered that a patient's request to hasten death can sometimes be rational, only 33% (CI: 28-38) and 23% (CI: 16-30) respectively regarded VE as ethically right and 22% (CI: 18-36) and 15% (CI: 8-20) respectively would practise VE if it were legal. Logistic regression model analysis showed that the respondents' profession was not a statistically independent factor predicting his or her response to any question regarding attitudes towards VE. Conclusions—A minority of responding doctors and nurses thought VE was ethically or legally acceptable. There seems no significant difference in attitudes towards VE between the doctors and nurses. However, only doctors had practised VE. (shrink)

What should Japanese doctors do when asked by a patient for active voluntary euthanasia, when the family wants aggressive treatment to continue? In this paper, we present the results of a questionnaire survey of 366 Japanese doctors, who were asked how they would act in a hypothetical situation of this kind, and how they would justify their decision, 23% of respondents said they would act on the patient’s wishes, and provided reasons for their view; 54% said they would not practice (...) VE, either because they were opposed to VE as such, or because they believed that the wishes of the patient’s family should be respected.Analysis of these responses yielded the following results: Doctors willing to respect the patient’s wishes defended their decision by highlighting the significance of patient autonomy and the patient’s exclusive ownership of his or her life; doctors unwilling to act on the patient’s wishes fell into two broad categories — those who based their reasoning on the family’s objections, and those who provided other reasons for refusing VE. Respondents who said they would not comply with the patient’s wishes because of family objections provided the following kinds of rationale: doctors have serious responsibilities not only to the patient, but also to the patient’s family; the importance of the family-doctor relationship; fear of lawsuits for murder and related criminal offences; the need for agreement among all those affected by the decision, and the belief that the patient’s life is not his or her own, but the family’s. Respondents who gave non-family centred reasons for not complying with the patient’s wishes pointed to values such as the sanctity of life, or the importance of a natural deathIn the remainder of this paper, we discuss the implications of a family-centred approach to VE. (shrink)