{"id":2029,"date":"2009-01-23T09:00:47","date_gmt":"2009-01-23T13:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/wnet\/religionandethics\/?p=2029"},"modified":"2014-02-05T11:56:19","modified_gmt":"2014-02-05T16:56:19","slug":"january-23-2009-end-of-life-dilemmas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/wnet\/religionandethics\/2009\/01\/23\/january-23-2009-end-of-life-dilemmas\/2029\/","title":{"rendered":" End of Life Dilemmas"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Alzheimer&#8217;s disease gets progressively worse and there is no known cure. After a certain point, should an Alzheimer&#8217;s patient be kept alive with a feeding tube? Many family members say, of course: they should do everything possible to prolong a loved one&#8217;s life. But some doctors say inserting a feeding tube is inhumane, because it can just prolong a vegetative state for years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Alzheimer&#8217;s disease gets progressively worse and there is no known cure. After a certain point, should an Alzheimer&#8217;s patient be kept alive with a feeding tube? Many family members say, of course: they should do everything possible to prolong a loved one&#8217;s life. But some doctors say inserting a feeding tube is inhumane, because it can just prolong a vegetative state for years. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/wnet\/religionandethics\/2009\/01\/23\/january-23-2009-end-of-life-dilemmas\/2029\/\" class=\"more\">More <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":56,"featured_media":21922,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[6577,6782,1321,17908,982],"class_list":["post-2029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-alzheimers-disease","tag-end-of-life-care","tag-ethics-tag","tag-health","tag-medicine","topics-health-and-medicine"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.1.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>January 23, 2009 ~ End of Life Dilemmas | January 23, 2009 | Religion &amp; Ethics NewsWeekly | PBS<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Alzheimer&#039;s disease gets progressively worse and there is no known cure.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/wnet\/religionandethics\/2009\/01\/23\/january-23-2009-end-of-life-dilemmas\/2029\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"January 23, 2009 ~ End of Life Dilemmas | January 23, 2009 | Religion &amp; Ethics NewsWeekly | PBS\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Alzheimer&#039;s disease gets progressively worse and there is no known cure.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/wnet\/religionandethics\/2009\/01\/23\/january-23-2009-end-of-life-dilemmas\/2029\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Religion &amp; 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