What really pisses me off in all this is that this girl and her parents in a first world country had the chance to take advantage of the kind of medical care that much of the world can only dream about and yet chose to throw it away in favour of woo. Fine, it was her choice whether to continue treatment or not and I don't care about that per se. I wasn't the one living her life. Fact remains that had she been living in a less prosperous nation, she wouldn't have had that choice.

Sorry.
/rant

(January 26, 2015 at 2:55 pm)Lek Wrote: My position is that because she had a lethal condition, that the parents, who are closest to the girl and her situation and needs, make an appropriate decision for treatment.

An appropriate decision? She died, Lek. And she didn't have to either; the prognosis gave her a good chance of survival if she'd continued the treatment she was taken off of. Based on all the medical knowledge available, this was exactly the opposite of an appropriate decision.

Quote: This was not murder or suicide, but death from a natural cause.

A death by natural causes that was totally avoidable, and in fact instigated by the choices of the parents. They were the cause of the death, because they had a method of stopping it right there, and actively chose to do the opposite of that.

Quote:Now would you answer my question to you? Why is okay for an adult to avoid excruciating procedures and let a disease run its course but not to allow a child that option? Why is it okay not to put your dog through painful chemo therapy that could save his life, but it's not okay to do that for your child?

I... did answer that? In the post you were quoting from, but for some reason you decided to cut out the part that contained the answer. And speaking of answering questions, that post also had some from you... that you really did avoid, so...

(January 26, 2015 at 9:52 pm)Parkers Tan Wrote: The fact that the child died speaks volumes about the quality of the decision those parents took.

The fact that you are defending a rejection of a proven course of treatment shown to send the cancer into remission in three-fourths of the cases in order to pursue an untried and ultimately fatal regimen with no medical basis is sad.

The fact is, if you had the option, you would send your own child to his or her death in order to glorify your faith; that is the only logical extrapolation here.

Don't you get it. She died of a stroke, not leukemia. Chemo can cause strokes.

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(January 26, 2015 at 11:15 pm)Esquilax Wrote: An appropriate decision? She died, Lek. And she didn't have to either; the prognosis gave her a good chance of survival if she'd continued the treatment she was taken off of. Based on all the medical knowledge available, this was exactly the opposite of an appropriate decision.

How did going off the treatment cause her to have a stroke? Seems more likely that the chemo caused her to have a stroke. She didn't die from leukemia.

(January 26, 2015 at 11:20 pm)Lek Wrote: Don't you get it. She died of a stroke, not leukemia. Chemo can cause strokes.

From the article:

Quote:Although her family claims her death was due to chemotherapy, in September, a McMaster oncologist testified at a hearing on a similar case of a First Nations girl refusing cancer treatment that Makayla had suffered a relapse.

(January 26, 2015 at 11:57 pm)Parkers Tan Wrote:

(January 26, 2015 at 11:20 pm)Lek Wrote: Don't you get it. She died of a stroke, not leukemia. Chemo can cause strokes.

From the article:

Quote:Although her family claims her death was due to chemotherapy, in September, a McMaster oncologist testified at a hearing on a similar case of a First Nations girl refusing cancer treatment that Makayla had suffered a relapse.

Here's what I got:

A Hamilton oncologist testifying at a hearing into an indigenous child who has quit chemotherapy in favour of traditional medicine says in a similar case earlier this year, another First Nation girl stopped her chemo and has now suffered a relapse.

Makayla Sault's leukemia has come back, according to testimony by McMaster Children's Hospital's Vicky Breakey. Although Breakey didn't name the patient, it's clear she was referring to Makayla.

Notice that first they say it came back and then they say the doctor didn't name Makayla. I'd like to hear the quote from the doctor. Like I said before though, she didn't die from leukemia. She died from a stroke, possibly caused by her chemo therapy.

Quote: Don't you get it. She died of a stroke, not leukemia. Chemo can cause strokes.

I just rolled my eyes so hard I saw my sinuses. Are you actually serious here?

Right. Quick lesson in medicine.

Leukemia is a disease of the blood.

Stroke is a what happens when there is a sudden lack of blood to an area of the brain. Usually because of a clot. Sometimes a bleed.

Leukemia, being a blood condition, fucks up the clotting mechanisms and can cause clots and bleeds.

Quote: Hematologic/ Cerebrovascular: Cerebral infarctionPatients with malignancies and leukemia in particular are at risk to develop cerebral infarction. Several mechanisms may be responsible, alone or in combination, for stroke in this patient population. The major causes of stroke in cancer patients are listed below in Table 4.

http://www3.mdanderson.org/depts/rpi/di/cnsclci.html

Which is why part of the care she eschewed for leukemia is regular blood tests to monitor her Inr (clotting), wbc, esr and a whole bunch of other stuff. That's PART of chemotherapy, they don't just pump you full of it and send you home!

Lek: I'm really close to entirely giving up on your morality. But I'll give it one more spin.

If everyone let their 11 year old children make all their decisions themselves, do you think that would be a good thing? And if not, why let them make the most important decision they could possibly make? (75% chance of life, versus certain death)

Do you really think it was explained to the girl that she would die if she stopped the chemo? Please answer this question at least.

(January 26, 2015 at 6:38 pm)Lek Wrote:

(January 26, 2015 at 6:12 pm)Fidel_Castronaut Wrote: A dedicated team of individuals that may include a combination of social workers, medical practitioners including consultants from oncology and pediatrics, other family members and so on.

When parents absolve themselves of caring for their children (children in the care system) then the state and/or foster parents become the de facto guardians until a child is found adoptive parents or is kicked out of the care system at 18 (or whatever age is relevant).

I think, Lek, you see the world in black and white terms where things are either 'good' or they're not. That's not reality, not anywhere, not even for you. You can make yourself think 'parents knows best', but the sheer number of children in the care system for example evidences this is to be a demonstrable delusion.

Where, then, does this leave us with the topic forwarded by the OP? It leaves us with the consideration that, when given a choice between embarking on a course of action that has a 75%~ chance of something happening and another course of action where the guaranteed result is death, a parent who chooses the later is in breach of the notion that 'a parent always knows best'.

I understand how the system works. One reason that I don't understand the fuss in this case is that she died of a stroke, not leukemia. What does that have to do with her not continuing chemo? Was the stroke caused by the state of her weakened body or did this 11 year old happen to have another unrelated condition that caused the stroke? From what I understand, chemotherapy can definitely cause a stroke.

You don't know that. Indeed you cant know that unless you're privvy to her medical files at the time of death and the resulting autopsy (presuming there was one - I doubt it considering the aversion to medicine).

As Jacob highlights above, leukaemia is a disease of the blood. A stroke is a lack of blood reaching a given area of the brain.

Now none of us know for sure, but it seems pretty disingenuous to dismiss any credible link between having a blood disease and an event caused by having an issue with your circulatory system, no?

Right. By choosing that course of action, she was definitely going to die. What happened to get her first is irrelevant, but as Fidel says, it's not even as unrelated as you think. I mean, someone could have run in and stabbed her. Would that have made their decision OK because she didn't directly die from it?

All we're really asking is that you speak to what you think is right, not what your religion thinks is right.

If it is all right for the girl and her parents to refuse treatment when there is a 75% chance she will recover, then is it all right for another family to decide to forgo treatment if there is a 90% chance their child will recover? Lek, under what circumstances do you believe that parents shouldn't be allowed to refuse medical intervention for their child?