Ethical issues around death and withdrawal of life support in neonatal intensive care
File(s)
Published version
Author(s)
Pant, Stuti
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Amongst all the traumatic experiences in a human life, death of child is considered the most painful, and has profound and lasting impact on the life of parents. The experience is even more complex when the death occurs within a neonatal intensive care unit, particularly in situations where there have been conflicts associated with decisions regarding the redirection of life-sustaining treatments. In the absence of national guidelines and legal backing, clinicians are faced with a dilemma of whether to prolong life-sustaining therapy even in the most brain-injured infants or allow a discharge against medical advice. Societal customs, vagaries, and lack of bereavement support further complicate the experience for parents belonging to lower socio-economic classes. The present review explores the ethical dilemmas around neonatal death faced by professionals in India, and suggests some ways forward.
Date Issued
2022-03-01
Date Acceptance
2021-05-10
Citation
Indian Journal of Pediatrics, 2022, 89, pp.274-278
ISSN
0019-5456
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Start Page
274
End Page
278
Journal / Book Title
Indian Journal of Pediatrics
Volume
89
Copyright Statement
© The Author(s) 2021. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
License URL
Identifier
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs12098-021-03810-9
Subjects
Pediatrics
Publication Status
Published
Date Publish Online
2021-06-18