The overall incidence of the withdrawal of life sustaining measures in European ICUs is not known, although withholding and withdrawing life support is actively used by most European intensivists, shortening of the dying process remains rare. In the treatment of terminally ill patients in Japan, new surveys indicate that Japanese physicians tend to treat the patients more aggressively. An analysis showed that in Japan, patients wishes are often not taken into account while a greater weight is placed on the feelings of the family. The overall feeling in Japan is that to withdraw or withhold treatment is essentially to abandon the patient and heroic measures are usually undertaken in an attempt to prolong the patient's life until family members are present at the bedside to witness the time of death. The physicians in Japan who were interviewed regarding end of life care still seemed to feel that withdrawing or withholding...
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