Consulting a trained physician when considering a request for euthanasia: An evaluation of the process in flanders and the Netherlands
Abstract
In Belgium and the Netherlands, consultation of a second independent physician by the attending physician is mandatory in euthanasia cases. In both countries, specialized consultation services have been established to provide physicians trained for that purpose. This retrospective study describes and compares the quality of consultation of both services based on surveys of attending physicians and those providing the consultation (consultants). While Dutch consultants discussed certain subjects, for example, alternative curative or palliative treatment more often with the attending physician than Belgian consultants, both usually discussed those subjects considered necessary for a quality consultation and were independent from patient and attending physician. Over 90% of attending physicians in both countries evaluated the consultant's knowledge of palliative care, patient's disease, and judicial procedure, and their communication skills, as sufficient. Consultation with specialized consultation services seems to promote quality of euthanasia consultations.
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Except from one study on 100 psychiatric patients in one private clinical practice, very little is known about the number of euthanasia requests being granted, refused, denied, ongoing or withdrawn.
“except from one study on 100 psychiatric patients in one private clinical practice (Thienpont et al., 2015), very little is known about the number of euthanasia requests being granted, refused, denied, ongoing or withdrawn (Van Wesemael et al., 2010).”
From Psychiatric patients requesting euthanasia: Guidelines for sound clinical and ethical decision making (2019) · cites this paper as Van Wesemael et al., 2010
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Self-citation
- Authors
- Van Wesemael, Y., Cohen, J., Bilsen, J., Onwuteaka-Philipsen, B. D., Distelmans, W., & Deliens, L.
- Affiliations
- End-of-Life Care Research Group, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Belgium,
- Vrije Universiteit Brussel (BE)
- Amsterdam Public Health (NL)
- End-of-Life Care Research Group, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Belgium, Department of Public and Occupational Health, EMGO Institute for Health and Care Research, Expertise Centre for Palliative Care, VU University Medical Centre, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
- Venue
- Evaluation & the Health Professions
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2010-05-18
- Volume
- 33
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 497-513
- ISSN
- 0163-2787 (ISSN-L)
- 1552-3918
- OpenAlex
- W2099412817
- Cited by
- 13
- References
- 18
- Citations by year
- 2025: 2 · 2023: 2 · 2022: 1 · 2019: 1 · 2015: 1 · 2013: 1 · 2012: 3
- FWCI
- 1.91
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Evaluation & the Health Professions (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Pure Amsterdam UMC (publishedVersion)
- Amsterdam UMC (VU Amsterdam) - Institutional Repository (publishedVersion)
- Ghent University Academic Bibliography (Ghent University) (submittedVersion)
- Digital Academic REpository of VU University Amsterdam (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam) (submittedVersion)
- DigitalGeorgetown (Georgetown University Library) (submittedVersion)
- VUBIR (Vrije Universiteit Brussel) (submittedVersion)
- Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Vlaamse regering
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health › Palliative Care and End-of-Life Issues
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health › Palliative and Oncologic Care
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health › Ethics and bioethics in healthcare
- Keywords
- euthanasia, second opinion, attending physicians, palliative care, communication skills, court proceedings, Flanders, Netherlands, Belgium
- MeSH terms
- Adult, Aged, Aged, 80 and over, Belgium, Female, Humans, Male, Medical Staff, Hospital, Middle Aged, Netherlands, Quality Assurance, Health Care, Referral and Consultation, Retrospective Studies, Euthanasia, Active, Voluntary, Mandatory Programs
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