The article, titled "Terminal Anorexia Nervosa," argues that some patients suffering from anorexia should be given terminal diagnoses. From the article:
"Designating terminal AN may more readily enable patients to receive palliative care, hospice care, and emotional and practical resources for loved ones, as well as access to medical aid in dying (MAID) where legal. Therapeutic goals in these situations are to ameliorate suffering and honor the life lived."
The article goes on to say that MAID "is offered to individuals whose death is inevitable within six months from an underlying disease process..."
Mental illness does not have an underlying disease process that will end a patient's life like other diseases might. Anorexia can be combated by compelling an individual to receive nutrition. By diagnosing cases of mental illness as terminal, psychologists will simply be giving up on providing them with treatment. Instead, those who suffer from mental illness can be simply tossed aside.
