Right to Die

Regarding “It Started With Quinlan: The Ever Expanding ‘Right to Die,’ ” Opinion, March 31:

I’m concerned about the “ever expanding right to die.” As the article points out, “it might be difficult to make a principled distinction between physician-assisted suicide (where the patient performs the act that brings about death) and physician-administered voluntary euthanasia (where the physician performs the death-causing act).”

Sometimes, in the effort to relieve pain, the physician comes dangerously close causing to the patient’s death from the medication; but it should never be the doctor’s intent to cause death. Nor should the doctor be punished if death occurs. The patient is, after all, terminal, and death expected.

In my 35 years of medical practice, I never intentionally caused a patient’s death and I do not want the privilege now. Doctors must continue to improve their skill, so that they can kill pain, not patients.

MELVIN H. KIRSCHNER MD

Van Nuys