Sometimes it happens that a patient dies with us without any emergency situation. If a person loses his strength after a long fight against an illness or after a long life in general, becomes weaker and weaker – if all therapy options have been exhausted and it is absolutely certain that nothing will lead to the patient getting well again, then that’s it such a case. Active euthanasia is forbidden in Germany. But freezing the current treatment is allowed. This allows the natural dying process to take its course.
Such a decision does not happen in one night. It takes days, weeks or repeated stays with us before the treating doctor, in consultation with the relatives, says: It’s no longer possible, now is the time to withdraw – it’s the best thing for the patient.
This does not mean that the patient is left to his own devices. For example, the sufferer continues to be given morphine because it relieves pain and anxiety. The medical measures vary from case to case.
Nursing care continues to be based on individual needs, but always with a clear focus: giving the patient as much peace and quiet as possible. Of course I don’t behave unnecessarily hectic and loud towards other patients. But with the dying, I only do what is necessary and what is good for them – and that is rest. In such cases my work has something meditative about it.
Intensive care specialist Pola Gülberg from the Ebersberger district clinic.
(Photo: Peter Hinz-Rosin)
I remember a patient whose hands I massaged with an oil intended for this purpose, gently and slowly. At that moment, I didn’t notice anything else that was happening on the ward. I was completely with my patient. The song “Amazing Grace” popped into my head, soon I was humming it, barely audible – like a mantra. As I was taking care of my patient in this trance-like state, I suddenly whispered to her, “Everything is fine, you may let go now.”
It was only after I had spoken the sentence that I realized that I had formulated it in Spanish – although my patient did not speak that language at all. For me, Spanish is the more emotional of my two mother tongues. When I’m very emotional, I often think or speak Spanish without making a conscious decision to do so.
The fact that my patient could not understand me at all was not a problem. Something else was important: Because speaking Spanish or humming “Amazing Grace” puts me in a calm mood, I did my best to create a feel-good atmosphere for my patient – and she needed that to go in peace be able.
Pola Gülberg is an intensive care nurse. In this column, the 38-year-old talks about her work at the district clinic in Ebersberg every week. The collected texts are below sueddeutsche.de/thema/Auf Station to find.