Aug. 18, 2011
By MIKAELA CONLEY
via Good Morning America

At 92 and 90, Armond and Dorothy Rudolph’s bodies were failing them. He suffered severe pain from spinal stenosis, a narrowing of the spinal column. She was almost entirely immobile. Both suffered from early dementia, according to their son Neil Rudolph. They wanted to die.

The Rudolphs, married for 69 years, decided to refuse food and water to end their lives. Although they lived in the Village at Alameda, an assisted living facility in Albuquerque, N.M., they maintained they had a right to die on their own accord.

Three days into their fast, the couple told their plan to staff at the facility. Administrators immediately called 911, citing an attempted suicide.

The Village evicted the couple, and the next day, the Rudolphs moved into a private home, where they again stopped eating and drinking. Ten days after he began the fast, Armond Rudolph died. Dorothy Rudolph died the following day.

READ MORE . . .

Helping Dementia Patients Avoid Premature Death – OpEd SD UT
March 5, 2015
By Stanley A. Terman, PhD, MD
U-T San Diego Op-Ed

How long do I have?” is question No. 1 after receiving a terminal diagnosis. If diagnosed with dementia, often the next is, “How can I avoid prolonged dying in advanced dementia?”

The movie “Still Alice” featured Julianne Moore in an Academy Award-winning performance portraying losses of memory, family, profession, independence, perhaps dignity and losing control over one’s destiny.

Some early stage dementia patients actively commit suicide; others passively hasten their dying. Premature dying is sad since living can be reasonably good through middle-stage dementia.

READ MORE . . .