Elder Abuse

Re “Making ‘Death With Dignity’ Reality,” Nov. 30.

Terminally ill, elderly patients do not need “death with dignity” as much as life with dignity. Too often health-care providers view the very sick, older patient as an inappropriate recipient of life-sustaining medical treatment. Many doctors and nurses, young and healthy themselves, do not appreciate that for some of these patients (as well as those who deeply love them) several more months of a physically restricted life is decidedly preferable to no life at all. As consumers, we must not allow the medical community to make a one-size-fits-all judgment about the potential quality of life that could be afforded to these patients. Neither can we, as a moral society, continue to treat our terminally ill elderly population with as little interest as yesterday’s newspaper, precisely because they seem to have so little time left.

LYNN F. KESSLER

Sherman Oaks