The right to die.

I am not saying they should or shouldn't have a right but more like they should be the ones ending their own life. What if a doctor is ordered to kill a patient but doesn't want to?

Terminally ill patients who are dying anyway should just wait 2-3 mths and with mentally ill, well we dont know the amount of suffering anyhow. Just my opinion...Religiously based

Thats a very prejudiced attitude. Im mentally ill and I feel as though I should be able to decide whether to live or die. People with mental illness dont suddenly become incoherent and unable to make decisions.

That's why said 'I'm not sure...', because I understand that different mental illnesses affect different people in different ways - for example, would you accept if a patient who is in their later stages of dementia were to suddenly say that they wanted to die?

dementia is not a mental illness, it's a brain disease. get your facts straight.

Either way, it most certainly affects your mental status and ability to think straight.

Btw, it is a mental illness:

http://www.alzheimers.org.uk/site/scripts/documents_info.php?documentID=117

Thats a very prejudiced attitude. Im mentally ill and I feel as though I should be able to decide whether to live or die. People with mental illness dont suddenly become incoherent and unable to make decisions.

No not either way, if youre gonna argue then do your research first. Dementia can cause depression in some people but it is by no means a mental illness itself. Look up the definition. I don't know why youre showing me the mental health act.

No not either way, if youre gonna argue then do your research first. Dementia can cause depression in some people but it is by no means a mental illness itself. Look up the definition. I don't know why youre showing me the mental health act.

No not either way, if youre gonna argue then do your research first. Dementia can cause depression in some people but it is by no means a mental illness itself. Look up the definition. I don't know why youre showing me the mental health act.

Death is not painless even if you think it will be. Everyone will taste Death regardless if you use Nembutal.

Yeah that is religiously biased.

However, we have a moral set of codes that we lean towards naturally from birth, but you think we should forget these when we are in pain?

If I could afford to sustain a drug habit for all my life, is it right? Is it moral to do drugs?. No IMO

Why do patients always leave it to the very end when they are not capable of ending it themselves to ask for death?
If they are capable then there is no argument with any one is there?

Why dont you give them **** loads of heroin everyday to ease the pain along with some cocaine and ecstacy topped with a spliff.
I would not ever kill someone even if they asked. Tough

Dementia is considered a mental illness in medicine and the psychiatric field

If you read the 2nd sentence of the 1st paragraph of that webpage, you will see that dementia is classified as a mental disorder in England and Wales.

Now, back to my original point - would you accept if someone in their latter stages of dementia wanted to medically kill themselves? If yes, why, and if no, why not?

the key word here being disorder, not illness.
also you seem to be confusing dementia with alzheimer's disease, they're not the same.
yes of course, dementia is a horrible thing to die of.

Could you please explain the difference between a disorder and an illness then? (Genuinely curious, as I can't seem to find anything on Google about the two being any different - Wikipedia seems to use them interchangeably: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causes_of_mental_disorders and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_disorder)

I understand that Alzheimer's disease and dementia are not exactly the same; the former can be a cause of the latter.

Yes, of course it is horrible, but how would you be able to distinguish whether a patient with dementia really wanted to die, whereas it could also be the product of severe symptoms - when someone can't even remember who their son/daughter is, how do you think they would able to consent to medically committing suicide?

P.s. I've had a look at the references on those Wikipedia pages and they're all from primary, legit sources.

A mental disorder is presumed to have some biological cause, like Alzheimers disease or huntington's, which can cause memory loss.
you cant put dementia in the same category as anxiety, depression, schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, etc, because most of the time it arises from biological causes that often have no cure and are terminal.

Thanks for the explanation, which is all well and good, but your response has detracted from the main point - how can someone who's not in the right frame of mind be able to consent to killing themselves?