"In pain waiting to die": everyday understandings of suffering

Palliative & Supportive Care
Karen D Schwartz, Zana Marie Lutfiyya

Abstract

The notion of "suffering" is understood in very different ways in a variety of contexts. In palliative care, the relief and prevention of suffering is considered to be a fundamental goal (Pastrana et al., 2008). However, the avoidance of suffering has also been used as an argument by those campaigning for the legalization of euthanasia and assisted suicide (Finlay, 2009). In reflecting upon suffering in these two contexts, we were intrigued by Finlay's (2009) contention that to laypeople, the phrase "'unbearable suffering' conjures up images of patients on their deathbeds wracked with uncontrolled pain" (p. 1841). This article explores how suffering is used and understood in an "everyday" discourse, by analyzing comments posted to a website debating assisted suicide in the context of the Canadian case of Sue Rodriguez. Using a broad social approach to discourse analysis (Tonkiss, 2004), three themes emerged in our analysis: (1) when people suffer, (2) how people are understood to suffer, and (3) how suffering should be dealt with. We also examined what was not said in this discussion: there was little consideration of the more holistic goals of palliative care and how suffering might be understood and managed in ways other than...Continue Reading

References

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Citations

Aug 7, 2013·Palliative & Supportive Care·Karen Fletcher
Oct 1, 2014·Journal of Medical Systems·Penglai ChenDebin Wang
Aug 16, 2013·The American Journal of Hospice & Palliative Care·Lalit Kumar Radha KrishnaDevasena Manoharan
Feb 22, 2014·Current Opinion in Anaesthesiology·Gail A Van Norman

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