Suffering of terminal patients - philosophical-ethical reflections in the light of guidelines proposed by palliative-hospice medicine

Suffering is pain that concerns the psychological and spiritual spheres of a person. It is more difficult to remove than physical pain, as suffering concerns more complex and subjective issues. In palliative medicine, where we are confronted on a daily basis with the awareness of a poor prognosis and impending death, suffering is one of the most important therapeutic and ethical problems. As a speciality of the seriously ill and dying, palliative medicine has to address the patient's psycho-spiritual problems. The sources of suffering are varied: it is often the loss of the patient's social and family position as a consequence of increasing helplessness and dependence on others. Very dangerous from a further perspective is the psycho-spiritual pain due to loss of dignity or disfigurement, so often unnoticed by the family and those around the patient, and which can be the cause of a call for euthanasia.
Excerpt from the introduction
http://yadda.icm.edu.pl/yadda/element/bwmeta1.element.agro-03a20008-4941-4a8c-a663- ee44d8c3900f