Almost four years ago Audrey Parker's farewell words to the world were how Canadians perceive medically assisted deathand where she came from. We've changed the way Nova Scotia uses it.
Parker was diagnosed with stage 4 breast cancer in 2016.
Parker, who was terminally ill, wanted her to undergo a medically assisted death (MAID). Whether she has lost her consciousness or mental cognition due to their illness.
Parker said she died of her MAID on November 1, 2018.
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Parker's close friend Kim King said it was not an easy process.
“I don't know how long Audrey lived, but being able to use MAID was so important to her that it was a difficult decision to make,” said King.
"The cancer had moved to the back layers of her brain. She knew she could lose capacity at any moment.
In a final message to the public via a video posted three days before his death, Parker said: It will help people live without fear of being disenfranchised.”
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Parker said she didn't want to lose her "beautiful, peaceful, and most of all, painless death choice."
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Now her dying wishes are officially part of Nova Scotia's updated MAID policy. The
state announced Tuesday that it would remove the requirement that someone's natural death be "reasonably foreseeable" before accessing her MAID. It also said it would adopt Audrey's Amendment, eliminating the requirement that the patient be fully conscious to provide consent at the time of death.
It continues to inspire select people across Canada. One of them is Ron Her Posno of Nova Scotia, who has dementia.
"You don't have to take it early like Audrey," Posno said.
"When I lose my clarity, when I lose my reason, when I fail to recognize my wife who happens to be in the room with me, I want to take it."
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Dr. Gord, MAID Clinical Director, Nova Scotia Health Gubitz said the new policy includes a "final consent waiver."
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Audrey's Amendment was enacted in federal law in 2021, but has just been adopted in Nova Scotia is.
"In 2021, he had just over 500 referrals for consideration of dying medical assistance, and is on track to surpass that number this year," he said. .
"The advantage is that the person making the decisions, the patient, is in the driver's seat of all this. The suffering gets to the point where they need it."
91} — Using files from The Canadian Press.© 2022 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
