The Death With Dignity Act and Physician-Assisted Suicide Introduction According to the American Medical Association (1996), physician-assisted suicide (PAS) occurs when a doctor facilitates the death of a patient by providing either the means or information necessary to help the patient complete the end-of-life act. PAS has had a long and controversial history dating back to the ancient Greeks and Romans. They believed there was no point in prolonging life if continued pain and suffering was the only prognosis. The term euthanasia, in fact, derives from Greek and means "good death". It was only when Hippocrates and his Hippocratic Oath, which warned against medicine being deadly to patients, that a different vision was seen. Early Christians held the view that suicide or martyrdom was an honorable and noble end to one's life, a way to make the supreme sacrifice for God. Countering this view, Augustine of Hippo condemned suicide as a mortal sin, going against the God's law of "thou shalt not kill". As medicine has evolved and progressed exponentially since those ancient times, life may very well benefit from an increase in length, but it does not always equate to an increase in quality of life. PAS is a possible solution to this dilemma, albeit with many ethical and legal debates about it. Literature Review Currently, PAS is legal in the United States in three states: Oregon, the first in 1997, and then Washington and Montana, both later. in 2009. The Death with Dignity Act (DWDA) was proposed in 1994 in Oregon as a way for doctors to legally assist terminally ill patients who wanted to end their suffering and choose their time of death. It was initially blocked by the Fed... middle of paper... adopting measures like the DWDA is a real possibility. When that time comes, nurses will surely find themselves facing this problem more frequently. While it may be legal at that point, the nurse will have to individually decide their own personal interpretation of the basic nursing concept of “do no harm.” Works Cited Code of Ethics for Nurses. (2001). Retrieved from www.nursingworld.org/MainMenuCategories/EthicsStandards/CodeofEthicsforNurses/Code-of-Ethics.pdfLachman, V. (2010). Doctor-assisted suicide: compassionate release or murder?. MEDSURG Nursing, 19(2), 121-125.Rose, T. (2007). Physician-assisted suicide: Development, status, and nursing perspectives. Journal of Nursing Law, 11(3), 141-151.Volker, D. (2007). Oregon's experience with assisted suicide. Journal of Nursing Law, 11(3), 152-162.