College students' attitudes towards physician‐assisted death for persons with dementia

Abstract

AbstractBackgroundThe number of persons with dementia is expected to increase by 50% in the next 10 years, yet there is still no cure for this devastating disease (World Health Organization, 2018). The Netherlands, Belgium, and Switzerland have legalized physician assisted death (PAD) for persons with dementia; however, no states in the U.S. have done so (Menzel & Steinbock, 2013). PAD is a controversial topic that has been subject to clinical, ethical and political debate (Emanuel et al., 2000). There is research investigating the fundamental consideration of whether PAD should be considered at all in cases of dementia (Tomlinson & Scott, 2014); however, there is a lack of research focused on answering the question: under what conditions is PAD deemed acceptable for persons with dementia? This study aimed to fill that gap. This study consisted of a survey that assessed students’ attitudes towards PAD across 16 different vignettes. 128 Dartmouth College undergraduate students completed the survey. An ordinal logistical regression analysis revealed that the gender and age of the person with dementia does not significantly affect attitudes towards PAD while illness severity and frequency of requesting PAD do. ANOVA analyses revealed that student gender and family history of dementia do not affect overall acceptability of PAD, but religious affiliation does. Atheists are more accepting of PAD than those who identify with a religious faith, and those identify as “very religious” are significantly less accepting of PAD than those who identify as less religious. The results of this study elucidate the factors that college students view as important in medical decision‐making for persons with dementia.