Question 

My mother is 95 years old. She has lived a long, wonderful life and it may be enough. Really, I am not sure that she can expect more from a life than she has had. 

I am wondering if we should start withholding some of her medication at this point because it may only be prolonging her life. We set up her medication so it would be easy enough to do without causing questions, since she takes so many medications, she is not likely to notice. I do not want to harm my mother; I simply do not want to drag out this process of dying for her sake and ours. 

I realize this is an odd question to ask, but I doubt that I am the first person to wonder about this, so I thought I would simply ask. 

Answer 

I do appreciate your situation, and you are not the first person to have asked that question. Caregivers do become weary. They have other commitments, and they are trying to balance the care of a parent with a job and their immediate family. The pressure to be in two or three places at one time is tough. 

It would be a hard no though on altering your mother’s medication regime to hasten death. What you are considering would be a crime. I realize it is not the same as poisoning someone. Withholding doctor ordered life supporting medication without a person’s knowledge is abuse though. So, no you cannot do that. 

Yes, people reject treatment at times when the likelihood of it being effective is marginal. It is most common in terminal cancer situations, when there is very little chance of the treatment working.  What I am referring to here is someone making that choice for themselves. That is a different situation than deciding for someone else without their knowledge. 

Many medications provide symptom relief that keep a patient comfortable. Withdrawing or withholding that medication may cause undue suffering. Only an experienced healthcare provider should be determining what medication your mother should take. He or she knows the impact of the medications a patient is taking and has years of patient experience with those medications. 

Since you are setting up her medication for her, your mother either cannot see well enough to do it, is not cognitively able to set it up correctly, or does not have the manual dexterity to complete the task. She may be past the point of making fully informed decisions about her health and treatments.

It is okay to discuss your thoughts with her doctor at her next visit. Do though leave the decisions about medication to her doctor and then follow the orders.