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Christianity Today, March (Web-only), 2009 |

Does Faith Prolong Suffering for Cancer Patients?

A new study suggests that cancer patients who are religious are more likely to seek measures that attempt to prolong life.

G. Jeffrey MacDonald, Religion News Service | posted 3/26/2009 09:38AM

Two years ago, Kevin Brumett was diagnosed with lung cancer. He was 29, and had never smoked in his life. After an initial round of successful treatment, the cancer has since spread to his brain.

Still, ...

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Glenn Penner

Posted: April 02, 2009 1:51 PM

As someone who is actually dying of cancer, I have chosen the route of giving instructions not to not to resuscitate me should my heart stop or put me on a ventilator if I should stop breathing, or to put me on artificial life support due to medical circumstances related to my cancer. It was (and is) not an easy decision but I think it is the right one. For the Christian, life is more than life. Of course, I would love to do more, especially as I love my ministry to persecuted Christians around the world (I am CEO of The Voice of the Martyrs in Canada) but I also think that this ministry has also helped prepare me for my own path of suffering; a path that has only deepened my walk with God.

donna guzman

Posted: March 30, 2009 4:01 PM

I don't understand 'heroic' measures at all, except perhaps for a child. If a person really and truly believes in God, why would you want to prolong this life instead of accepting the reality of a terminal disease? I've gone through this 3 times with different family members and nothing good really ever comes of heroic measures, maybe a few months extra to lay in a bed and be very sick, and where is the joy in that for the caregivers and family. What kind of 'testimony' is it when we do everything possible NOT to be with the Lord? I wonder a lot about this subject and the experiences I've had. And I agree that the financial cost can keep a lot of others from getting even basic care.

M	Posted: March 27, 2009 2:46 PM

Colson's comments against the JAMA study misunderstand the data. First, if 14% of religious copers are seeking aggressive care at the end of life, this is a sizable and large population of people -- in the millions. This is not a statistical blip. Second, the JAMA study only follows three measures in the last week of life (death in an ICU, CPR, ventilation). But what happens when the measures are expanded to 2-4 weeks or 2-3 months? What happens when you expand definitions of "heroic" to include receiving chemo, etc.? That 14% is going to vastly increase to 30%+. Imagine 30% of Christians who are terminally ill and still receiving aggressive care at EOL -- it is troublesome and requires a major response from church leaders.

Michael

Posted: March 27, 2009 2:24 PM

Joe Kaul's comments are exactly right!! This is the trick. The ones who have the potential to offer help when medical decisions and spiritual issues intertwine are spiritual physicians and nurses. They are the only ones who have an adequate ability to bring together spiritual issues and medical decisions. Physicians and nurses are the ones who must lead the church in addressing the problems associated with the end of life.

Alcuin

Posted: March 27, 2009 10:39 AM

Life is good. The creator of the universe loves us and wants to be in the deepest possible relationship with us. Why shouldn't we want to live? Of course I will endure a painful procedure to continue to live this wonderful life. But I would not opt for a procedure if I realized that how much that million dollar price tag, covered by my insurance, represents a strain on the system. This kind of strain makes it impossible for many people to receive basic preventative care. The problem here is economics: most medical systems hide the costs from the patients so they can't make good choices.

Bill	Posted: March 27, 2009 9:13 AM

On March 20 Chuck Colson used his BreakPoint to address this study: "The "vast majority" of the patients-some 90 percent of those who were religious and 97 percent of those who were not-did not want "heroic measures," such as mechanical ventilators or CPR, to be used in their cases. Based on that seven percentage-point difference the New York Times proclaimed "Religious Belief Linked to Desire for Aggressive Treatment in Terminal Patients." Please. Do a little more math and you will realize that sweeping generalizations like "far more likely to seek aggressive, life-prolonging care" are based on the responses of approximately 25 people. The researchers acknowledged that the study didn't explore why this small handful of religious patients sought "extensive end-of-life care." That didn't stop them from speculating anyway. One of the study's authors disabused Times' readers of the idea that "spiritual patients are more likely to say their lives are in God's hands.""

E. Paul Imhof

Posted: March 27, 2009 5:07 AM

Personal experience, observation of cancer patients and informal interviews with them, their extended family and medical personell in my native Vienna, Austria, indicate that relatives' caring support, economic considerations and conflict of interest distort "positive religious coping's " impact. Many Moslim immigrants told me that their father, mother, wife or brother felt sorry for Christian patients hardly anybody visits. Obviously a steday flow of familiar visitors strenghtens regardless how long they stay the seriously sick. Some stick arounds for hours prayer beads in hand while others chat incessantly. Terminal patients eyes light up as young couples bring a baby for a blessing. Pray for people asking to limit the number of visitors per patient. God gives few Americans, generous National Health care many Austrians "strenght to fight cancer as hard and long as possible." Resulting economic considerations defy comparison.

Elizabeth

Posted: March 27, 2009 1:21 AM

I've seen where it goes the opposite of this article, too. Last year a cousin had a recurrence of cancer and refused treatment except for pain. He said the doctors were really pushing for him to accept treatment, but admitted it would prolong his life only by 6 months to a year. Said he knew where he was going and saw no need to go through the suffering of chemo and radiation again just to add a little more time here on earth. Also, consider that religious, even christian, does not mean that the person truly has a relationship with God. My husband says he is christian, but I never see him pray or study the word, and he thinks the kids and I "overdo" the "church thing." Every death in the family I have observed him around he was very angry that "doctors gave up," even when other family members agreed it was time to stop treatment. He is obsessed himself with health, vitamins, diet, etc. His vitamins and OTC medicines take up more room in the bathroom than my make-up and hair stuff.

Joe Kaul

Posted: March 26, 2009 10:58 PM

Being a critical care nurse in an urban medical ICU, I have innumerable times seen how ill prepared are so many evidently devoutly religious patients and families, of various faiths, to accept the end of a loved one’s earthly existence. It is just here, at the point of confronting the visceral reality of physical death, that the exercise of faith can become dysfunctional by enabling denial. When and how is one who believes in a God who has raised people from sickbeds and even the dead, to know its time to let go? And what family of such faith can escape contemplating, wrongly, that perhaps they are failing and abandoning their beloved when they are forced to be the ones to say, ‘Stop: That’s enough.’? We ask so very much of these poor, ill prepared, surviving souls. This is the trick, to know when and how to transition from a hope that is present and temporal to one that is future and eternal.

Brian Lyke

Posted: March 26, 2009 8:02 PM

I find this article very disturbing. As a former hospice chaplain I've journeyed with many terminally ill people and have seen what happens when they give themselves over to aggressive, and sometimes experimental treatments that result in poor quality of life at great expense to themselves and their loved ones. For a young person a more aggressive treatment may be warranted, but for older people who've retired and want to enjoy their remaining years, the promise of cure or remission can be a slippery slope to disaster. Death is very much a part of life and dying well is hard to do in this culture. As soon as you are admitted to the hospital you've put yourself in the hands of people for whom death is the enemy to be defeated at all costs. For some this is good news. For others it can be the worst possible situation. Make friends with death now, accept that your body will die one day, and should you hear the news that your illness is terminal, give yourself to love, not fear.

Michelle

Posted: March 26, 2009 5:50 PM


I'm not sure I get the point to this subject! I do fight a terminal disease and I wouldn't prolong life if I knew my changes were slim and rack up a large medical bill. I'm sure about my destiny and I'm what they call religious. To be with God is golden. The only reason I would prolong it is because I would want to tell more people about Christ.

Howard Pepper

Posted: March 26, 2009 4:01 PM

One set of data that could be instructive to seek out, suggested by this reported research is this: What percentage of highly religious people (or specifically Christian), when faced with death, are confident about their destiny after it, and feel prepared to enter it? While it would seem that concerns over "assurance of salvation" are concentrated mostly in the young, might such research reveal that perhaps many even among much older believers still have concerns about their destiny?

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