Report of the Northern California Conference for Guidelines on Aid-in-Dying: Definitions, Differences, Convergences, Conclusions

Abstract

In September 1996, the Stanford University Center for Biomedical Ethics convened a conference entitled "Comprehensive Care of the Terminally Ill: The Northern California Consensus Development Conference for Guidelines on Aid-in-Dying." The regionally based, multidisciplinary conference gathered people from a variety of disciplines and diverse perspectives on physician aid-in-dying. This report documents important points of convergence, disagreement, and uncertainty that emerged from the conference and provides commentary on crucial issues: the definition of terminal illness, ensuring adequate palliative care, psychiatric challenges, coping with family pressures, the doctor-patient relationship, the managed care context, the role of ethics committees, and institutional challenges. Should physician aid-in-dying become a legal practice in California, the report will provide guidance to health care organizations, health professionals, and public policy officials engaged in local or state guideline or policy development.