Attitudes of Elderly Patients and Their Families Toward Physician-Assisted Suicide

While many frail elderly patients favored PAS in cases of terminal illness, the proportion that opposed it was significantly higher than that among relatives; relatives, in turn, displayed only a marginal ability either to predict patients' attitudes or to agree among themselves. Patients who oppose PAS represent a particularly vulnerable element of society (elderly persons, women, black individuals, and poor, uneducated, and demented persons), and such patients may warrant special protection.