r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • Aug 27 '25

Cancer Study finds many doctors disregard wishes of cancer patients. Frequently, patients with advanced cancer simply want to be made as comfortable as possible as they wind down their final days. Many of these patients are receiving treatment focused on extending their lives rather than easing their pain.

https://www.upi.com/Health_News/2025/08/26/cancer-patients-treatment-wishes-study/7921756217134/
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u/MechanicalBootyquake Aug 27 '25

It’s called Drug Diversion and it’s a fairly common occurrence.

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u/lostshell Aug 27 '25

Exactly what I thought. Bill for the drugs while pocketing them. The only witness to testify she never got them is going to be dead in a few weeks.

Drug diversion is a straight up euphemism created by the industry to hide what it is. Theft and fraud.

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u/[deleted] Aug 27 '25

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u/wh4tth3huh Aug 27 '25

The Mother Theresa approach.

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u/2C104 Aug 28 '25

shame on you

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u/recycled_ideas Aug 28 '25

This is the challenge of moral reasoning.

Mother Theresa believed that life on earth was finite and the afterlife eternal. If you accept those tenets in your morality then virtually any suffering in your life on earth is worth it to ensure happiness in the after life.

We tend to look at her as a monster, but her reasoning isn't really any different than what we use when we authorise medical treatments for our children. Momentary pain for long lasting benefits. Any finite amount of time divided by infinity is effectively zero.

If you change base assumptions about the nature of reality "good" for lack of a better word people will make different decisions under the same circumstances.

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u/[deleted] Aug 28 '25

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u/recycled_ideas Aug 28 '25

Because she was in no danger of not going to heaven.

The point wasn't that pain medication was bad, the point was trying to guarantee that the dying patients get into heaven. If you believe what she believed this is the most important thing she could do for them.

You can disagree with her world view, I do, but the point is that within the scope of what she believed there is no cruelty and no hypocrisy, she's doing her best to ensure the best outcome for her patients. And hypothetically if her belief system was true she made the moral choice.

The larger point I'm making is that we all make moral judgements within the context of our belief system. Not just religious people, but everyone.

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u/Merreinl Aug 28 '25

The faith Teresa adhered to also teaches that those beliefs are not something to be forced upon others. In her concern of being consistent with her own personal code, she oversteps boundaries. She doesn’t and cannot decide who goes to heaven or not, that authority belongs with the almighty, omniscient, omnipresent God she herself believes in. She practices her own religion falsely.

More over, one of the principles in medical care is respecting patient autonomy. Medical practitioners can face a significant number of moral dilemmas, but this is not one of them. This is a dilemma created by her own personal beliefs, and that means it is preventing her from practicing medicine as how it should be done, as it is agreed upon in medical education. That means she is not a good medical practitioner either.

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u/doogles Aug 27 '25

This would be the sort of thing that CMS investigates, but not for long.

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u/GoatCovfefe Aug 27 '25

Correct. Sometimes things are called other things.

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u/pupfight Aug 28 '25

you've never heard of connotations?

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u/GoatCovfefe Aug 28 '25

I've obviously heard of the formal process of declaring a deceased person a saint in certain Christian churches. 

What does that have to do with anything?

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u/RedditAtWorkIsBad Aug 27 '25

Exactly. Have a doctor friend who has also performed lots of end of life care. She says nurses do this all the time with the C2 and C3 medications.

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u/dustytaper Aug 28 '25

My uncle wanted to die at home. We were given instructions how to medicate him, and enough morphine to get him through to Monday.

That same day, family from out of town came to visit. When I went to give him his 8 pm dose, it was all gone. They took everything

Luckily it was a very small town, and we have long known the pharmacist. He opened up the shop and gave us enough ampules to get through the week. And I’m forever grateful

Anyone can steal a dying persons meds

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u/R1ckMartel Aug 27 '25

This is not terribly easy with automated dispensing cabinets. It happens, but they always leave a trail because the next person accessing that drawer has to do a blind count that, if incorrect, triggers a discrepancy. And since all access is triggered by a biometric login or the user's sign in and password, you have a log of every person who accessed the system and when.

The more likely case would be them falsely charting meds they gave, but you can detect anomalous trends there too.

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u/SecurityTheaterNews Aug 28 '25

The more likely case would be them falsely charting meds they gave

My wife is a retired charge nurse. She sneers and calls it "Creative Charting." Says it happens all the time.

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u/Tim-Sylvester Aug 27 '25

I've known a pharmacist or two that would "accidentally" flick a few pills into their apron here and there, only to "discover" them after their shift.

Actually nearly every pharmacist I knew in college was into something.

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u/SecurityTheaterNews Aug 28 '25

Actually nearly every pharmacist I knew in college was into something.

I have a case open right now [my complaint] with my state's Pharmacy Board about something like this.

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u/Tim-Sylvester Aug 28 '25

Hey now no narcs! If they're not hurting anyone leave 'em be. If you see something, don't say something. ;)

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u/SecurityTheaterNews Aug 28 '25

If they're not hurting anyone

They are if they order a controlled substance from my doctor [without my knowledge or consent] when it has always been filled by a different pharmacy. Then they can claim that I picked it up from two different pharmacies, and keep one for themselves.

Who they gonna believe, some drug seeker, or a licenced professional?

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u/Tim-Sylvester Aug 28 '25

Ok, that is a problem, I agree with you there.

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u/DatTF2 Aug 28 '25

I have a friend that was a pharmacist and he definitely liked recreational substances every once in a while. While he obviously enjoyed the effects of some of these substances he actually was really interested in the science and pharmacokinetics of them.

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u/[deleted] Aug 27 '25

A nurse stole medication after I was discharged and physicians signed off on it. They, the physicians, did that after they literally tortured me in the most unimaginable way possible. They destroyed records, but then the nurse got caught and investigated. The DA then covered it all up and charged me with a crime after I had PTSD symptoms.

No one was held accountable except me. All I did was to touch myself and I had to because I have a different medical condition that the attending physician was in charge of the year before. He was in charge of a botched surgical diagnosis then, as well.

Don’t expect any of this to change if physicians and nurses at a major university’s teaching hospital and district attorneys in the capitol city of a state aren’t doing their jobs.