Study: Good death as important as long life

Most people would trade a few months of life if it meant a more comfortable death, U.S. researchers reported.

The study ties in with other research that shows people are beginning to value a good death as much as they do a long life, the team at the University of Pittsburgh said.

Writing in the journal Medical Care, Cindy Bryce and colleagues surveyed 104 people, offering six different scenarios involving an 80-year-old man who died after a one-month stay in an intensive care unit.

"From our research, we found that people care a great deal about the quality of the death experience," said Bryce, an assistant professor of medicine.

On average, interviewees would have been willing to trade seven months of healthy life to ensure better quality of care in the final month of life.

www.cnn.com...

Being that I believe one's mental and emotional state (at the moment of death) affects what happens to one's consciousness/energy/soul after death, I would have to agree that I would give up some life to make sure that I was at peace during the moment of my passing. Seven months (as they mentioned) does seem like a lot of life, but what is after maybe much longer to deal with in a negative state.

that's pretty interesting, my granny signed a "living will" to be sure that she will not be kept medically alive. She wants to die a peaceful death in her home, not in a hospital hooked up to machines and suffering when her death is imminent.

I don't beleive that death is imminent in all cases...

Too many stories around of people who have been given up for dead and then by the miracle of and grace of God, they live.

I have a family friend who can testify to this, had cancer and were given months to live, well it's now been 10 years plus and the cancer was barely detectable a few months back.

She refused radiation treatments and put her faith in God.

But I understand what you guys are talking about, especially since my Mom passed earlier this year, she had never talked about it and we had a tough time making the decision of what to do once there was "no hope". As far as other things that she would have done, I sometimes wish that she would have had a chance and time to say and do certain things, I guess we truely just never know.

My dad is now talking about making his "arrangements" for when the time comes...

My nan didn't want to die at hospital, so wanted to be around her family in her home. My nan put her faith in God and just said it was meant to be and her time was up.

And you wonder why the native americans always wished for their death to be as great as their life. They knew!