Physician-Assisted Dying committee  Good evening, everybody. It gives me great pleasure to come here. My intention is to be helpful and to really let you know the experience of a palliative care physician. I am a palliative care physician. I see patients in their homes in Toronto, and I am here trying to represent

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  Our palliative care training is woefully inadequate. At the University of Toronto, medical students get less than 16 hours in their whole curriculum. What kind of training have they had for exploring these kinds of requests? As a palliative care physician, I talk to patients abou

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  I don't think the actual procedure itself is that complex; I think the ability to respond compassionately to a request to hasten death is complex. If you look at why people request euthanasia, it breaks down into four areas. It's often an expression of despair. As well, for som

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  The truth is we don't have adequate data to know what access to palliative care is. That's the truth. We do know from the latest report from the Canadian Cancer Society that 45% of cancer patients are not seen by palliative care practitioners in their last year of life, so I don'

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  I'm sure that many more patients will want this at home, surrounded by their family, rather than in an institution.

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  As long as there was a willing provider in the home, absolutely. I think that's where people want to die.

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  I agree with what Dr. Blackmer is saying. It's hard to just have a rigid waiting period that will be appropriate. I would support that.

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  This isn't something that our association has discussed. Certainly, our association supports access, so I can see that it might be a viable solution in some places.

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  Yes.

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  I'm not sure I want palliative care to take all the credit. There's also personal growth and a chance of accommodation. There are two that come to mind. One gentlemen showed up in emergency, saying he wanted his life shortened because he was too sick to get on the plane to Switz

Physician-Assisted Dying committee  I think that might be generational. Medical students in residence now are getting more of it. There's a bigger cadre of people who do have palliative care skills, but I think a lot of people do not understand what palliative care is and are not referring appropriately because the

Justice committee  Good morning. My name is Monica Branigan, and it's a very big honour to represent the Canadian Society of Palliative Care Physicians. We are a society of 500 members, and we are dedicated to improving the quality of life for patients with life-limiting conditions. We would like

Justice committee  If I understand correctly, you're asking how you would be able to document or record that there was access to the services required. I think that's what we're proposing in amendment three. In terms of how somebody would know, I don't think it would actually require a judicial re

Justice committee  I think those are two different issues. Whether there are services to deal with the root causes of suffering and whether somebody is doctor shopping are, as I see it, two separate things. You're asking if there is a potential solution to doctor shopping. I think that one of the

Justice committee  I chair the working group on physician-hastened death. This is something that we have discussed. One of the things that you might consider is to say something like, “for patients entering the last year of their life as best we know”. The protection that can be put in there is a p