Five Years of Legal Physician-Assisted Suicide in Oregon

Abstract

Physician-assisted suicide for terminally ill residents of Oregon has been legal since October 1997. The authors analyzed data from physician reports on patients for whom a lethal medication is written, interviews with physicians, and death certificates. As part of a follow-up to previous reports, patients who died in 2002 after ingesting prescribed lethal medications are characterized and trends in the numbers of prescriptions written are evaluated. Despite increases, the number of terminally ill Oregon residents using physician-assisted suicide remains small relative to the overall number of deaths. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved)