We can still learn a lot about euthanasia in psychiatric patients

For the first time, Dutch files on euthanasia involving mental illnesses have been compared. Researcher Sisco van Veen looked at 35 cases from the 2015-2017 period. According to him, we can learn more from these interventions.

Van Veen is a psychiatrist in training and published his findings in an important Canadian scientific magazine and in the Tijdschrift voor Psychiatrie. He is 29 years old himself and has therefore not yet been able to process euthanasia requests. Nevertheless, he thinks it is important that more research is done, also because he himself may soon be faced with possible requests for euthanasia.

More often women

What strikes him most in his research is that the vast majority of psychiatric patients who have euthanasia performed are women. In addition, it appears that the average age does not deviate from euthanasia cases with a physical cause. In the cases he researched, it also appears that long-term depression and personality problems are often the basis of the desire for euthanasia.

The 35 files investigated represent approximately one fifth of the total files between 2015 and 2017. Not all cases are disclosed with the same amount of details for the time being.

Suffering without hope?

Euthanasia prompted by psychiatric complaints is a recurring discussion. The point of hopelessness in particular is a difficult point. “There is no question that the suffering is unbearable, but determining hopelessness in psychiatry is very complicated. In terminal cancer it is easier to understand,” says Van Veen.

In psychiatry, he says it is always difficult to say whether someone is getting rid of his or her ailment, which may make the situation better in the long run. He notices that the discussion about this continues to spasm. “We often hear the support or opposition very clearly, but 80 percent of the doctors are somewhere between these two opinions.”

More research

That makes it difficult. Van Veen therefore finds it remarkable that so little comparative research has been done on these sensitive matters. He believes that euthanasia, even with psychiatric disorders, is a reality we have to deal with.

It is precisely for this reason that research is needed. “Research is being done at the moment. Ethical testing is central to this. But we can learn even more from all the data on life termination.”

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