A Good Death An Argument for Voluntary Euthanasia

by Syme, Rodney

• ISBN13: 9780522855036
• ISBN10: 0522855032
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2008-05-01
• Publisher: Melbourne University Press

Summary

A Good Death is Rodney Syme's extraordinarily candid and controversial account of the many terminally ill people who he has assisted to end their lives. Over the last 30 years Syme, at first clandestinely and now publicly, has challenged the law on voluntary euthanasia, risking prosecution in doing so. He again risks prosecution for writing this book. A Good Death is a moving journey with those who came to Rodney Syme for help and a meditation on what it means to confront death in our culture. It is also a doctor's personal story about the moral dilemmas and ethical choices he faces working within the grey areas of the law. In A Good Death Rodney Syme argues for the end of the unofficial "conspiracy" of silence within the medical profession and the decriminalisation of voluntary euthanasia in Australia. Through Syme's determination to tell the stories of those who he has assisted to die with dignity, A Good Death also draws wider lessons of value for those who find themselves in a similar situation.

Author Biography

Rodney Syme has been in medical practice for forty-five years, primarily as a urological surgeon. He was Chair of the Victorian Section of the Urological Society of Australasia in 1990-92, and chair of the Urology Study Group of the Cancer Council of Victoria in 1992-94. He has had extensive experience with cancer patients and with people with severe spinal injuries. He has been an advocate for physician-assisted dying for nearly twenty years, and the President of the Dying With Dignity Victoria for ten years.