Artificial Nutrition and Hydration: artificial nutrition and hydration (or tube feeding) supplements or replaces ordinary eating and drinking by giving a chemically balanced mix of nutrients and fluids through a tube placed directly into the stomach, the upper intestine or a vein. Artificial nutrition and hydration can save lives when used until the body heals. Long-term artificial nutrition and hydration may be given to people with serious intestinal disorders that impair their ability to digest food, thereby helping them to enjoy a quality of life that is important to them. But long-term use of the tube feeding frequently is given to people with irreversible and end-stage conditions. Often, the treatment will not reverse the course of the disease itself or improve the quality of life. Some health care facilities and physicians may not agree with stopping or withdrawing tube feeding. Therefore, explore this issue with your loved ones and physician and clearly state your wishes about artificial nutrition and hydration in your advance directive.

Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation: Cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) is a group of treatments used when someone's heart and/or breathing stops. CPR is used in an attempt to restart the heart and breathing. It may consist only of mouth-to-mouth breathing or it can include pressing on the chest to mimic the heart's function and cause blood to circulate. Electric shock and drugs also are used frequently to stimulate the heart. When used quickly in response to a sudden event like a heart attack or drowning, CPR can be life saving. But the success rate is extremely low for people who are at the end of a terminal disease process. Critically ill patients who receive CPR have a small chance of recovering and leaving the hospital. If you do not wish to receive CPR under certain circumstances, and you are in the hospital, your doctor must write a separate do-not-resuscitate (DNR) order on the chart. If you are at home, some states allow for a non-hospital DNR order. This order is written by a physician and directs emergency workers not to start CPR.

Mechanical Ventilation: Mechanical ventilation is used to support or replace the function of the lungs. A machine called a ventilator (or respirator) forces air into the lungs. The ventilator is attached to a tube inserted in the nose or mouth and down into the windpipe (or trachea). Mechanical ventilation often is used to assist a person through a short-term problem or for prolonged periods in which irreversible respiratory failure exists due to injuries to the upper spinal cord or a progressive neurological disease. Some people on long-term mechanical ventilation are able to enjoy themselves and live a quality of life that is important to them. For the dying patient, however, mechanical ventilation often merely prolongs the dying process until some other body system fails. It may supply oxygen, but it cannot improve the underlying condition. When discussing end-of-life wishes, make clear to loved ones and your physician whether you would want mechanical ventilation if you would never regain the ability to breathe on your own or return to a quality of life acceptable to you.

Additional Issues: The distinction often is made between not starting treatment and stopping treatment. However, no legal or ethical difference exists between withholding and withdrawing a medical treatment in accordance with a patient's wishes. If such a distinction existed in the clinical setting, a patient might forgo treatment that could be beneficial out of fear that once started it could not be stopped. It is legally and ethically appropriate to discontinue medical treatments that no longer are beneficial. It is the underlying disease, not the act of withdrawing treatment that causes death.