BACKGROUND

Euthanasia consists of all those actions deliberately carried out by health professionals whose objective is to directly cause death at the express and voluntary request of a patient who presents physical and mental suffering following an irreversible disease. In many European and non-European countries, euthanasia and assisted suicide practices are legal, instead, in Italy, they constitute a crime and fall within the hypotheses punished by the Penal Code, but the suspension of treatment constitutes an inviolable right by art. 32 of the Constitution. With the sentence 242/2019 of the Constitutional Court, in Italy it is possible to request medically assisted suicide just in some precise conditions or to express their wishes regarding health treatments.The purpose of the study was to understand what is the opinion of the population about "assisted suicide", "palliative care"; detect if there is a difference between users who are facing a degenerative disease compared to those who are not affected by pathologies.

METHODS

Observational study developed by carrying out a bibliographic search by consulting databases and by administering the anonymous questionnaire, to a representative sample of the population. The tool used for data collection is made up of socio-demographic information, and a section containing the 16 items relating to knowledge and personal opinion on the topic under discussion.The interviews were conducted in waiting room of hospital. On the other hand, the questionnaire developed with the Google Forms app was sent to associations of patients suffering from oncological or rare diseases and shared via links for social platforms. Data collection was carried out from January to May 2023. Data were processed with SPSS software.

RESULTS

N= 344 questionnaires were analyzed with a distribution of respondents for 60.75% 51.16% not affected by pathologies VS 48.83% affected by a pathology.

65% (N=165) subjects affected by pathology with reduced life expectancy have expressed their will to donate organs and tissues and 35% (N=57) have already drawn up a living will,

From the analysis of the data it emerged that being in favor of euthanasia is significantly associated with the following variables: non-believer religious orientation (p < 0.001), widowed marital status (p < 0.001), disability (p < 0.0023), legal assisted status (p < 0.001) having suffered intense pain during a phase of one's life (n 185) (p < 0.005)

CONCLUSIONS

This study have shown that the number of requests for assisted suicide is continuously increasing due to the progressive aging of the population and the growing number of terminal illnesses. People who suffer are more likely to anticipate death.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Beernaert K, H. C. (2018). Information needs about palliative care and euthanasia: A survey of patients in different phases of their cancer trajectory. Patient Educ. Couns., 132-138.
Bellon F, M. J.-P.-T.-S.-A. (2022). The role of nurses in euthanasia. Int J Nurs Stud.
Borovecki A, C. M. (2022).Attitudes about withholding or withdrawing life-prolonging treatment, euthanasia, assisted suicide, and physician assisted suicide: a cross-sectional survey among the general public in Croatia. BMC Med Ethics, 23(1):13.
Carvajal C S, P. V. (2021). Rev Med Chil. Eutanasia: aclarando conceptos, 1502-1506. Gatti, L. C. (2023). Ruolo dell’infermiere nella diffusione della cultura nella donazione d’organo: indagine su conoscenza ed opinione.