Abstract
Euthanasia is the act of intentionally ending a life quickly and painlessly, or omitting to prevent it, to alleviate suffering when death is understood as the greater good or the lesser evil. An extended clinical approach refers to the expansion of the object of clinical interest, which is concerned not only with the disease, but also and above all with the individual. This study analyzes euthanasia from the perspective of extended bioethics. To this end, we used an excerpt from the novel Anne Prédaille by French writer Henri Troyat, in which the main character causes the death of her mother, who suffers from a terminal illness, by applying a high dose of morphine. The literary fragment was intended to show euthanasia as a matter of subjects with unique interrelated life stories, and not as the aseptic passage from life to death. We concluded that bioethics must consider the life history of people involved in the process of euthanasia.
Euthanasia; Bioethics; Clinical medicine; Medicine in literature