So Falls A Sparrow: Ethical Medical Decisions at the Bedside With and For the Sole Good of the Patient

In due course, every sparrow falls to the ground. It is nature's way. Many critically ill patients die too soon and their family and friends are often not prepared to let them go. Argument is made in So Falls a Sparrow that the first goals of medicine are to affirm the sacredness of human life, to relieve pain and discomfort, and to diagnose and cure disease. Therewith, to move on to more complex decisions of withholding and withdrawing medical intervention when the burdens of treatment outweigh the benefits and when life is pitted against life. Multithousands of patients with neocortical (upper) brain damage like Terri Schiavo, are sustained by technology in horribly debilitated non-sentient conditions for indeterminable periods of time, existing in netherworld states worse than death. Justice thus delayed is justice denied for significant numbers of hapless patients and adds to the burgeoning costs of national healthcare delivery. The thesis of Sparrow, in part, is that the Schiavo case revealed not only a wholesale lack of ethical, legal and medical knowledge among the lay public, but also at critically important levels of our nation's socio-political infrastructure and leadership. This discourse is intended to be a primer to be read by laypersons or to be used by pastors and other healthcare professionals in conversations or in teaching situations with their parishioners, clients, or students.