Original article Attitudes toward euthanasia of physician members of the Italian Society for Palliative

Background: The problems related to requests for euthanasia by terminal patients; the variations in attitude of palliative care physicians and the possibility that availability of the best palliative care might obviate the problem by eliminating requests for euthanasia, are under discussion. Design: A mailed survey with no possibility of follow-up of all 685 physician members of the Italian Society for Pallia-tive Care (SICP) in 1994. Results: Of the 359 (52.4%) responders, 139 (39%) had received requests for euthanasia; 16 of them (4 % of the re-sponders but 11.5 % of those who received requests) had complied at least once, while 216 (60%) had not; 125 (35%) thought that euthanasia was 'wrong ' under all circumstances; 115 (32%) thought that situations could occur, even in the context of palliative care, in which euthanasia might be ethi-cally 'correct'; 185 (52%) thought that the best palliative care might solve the problem of euthanasia, while 109 (30%) be-lieved otherwise. The variable most strongly associated with a negative attitude toward euthanasia and with the opinion that the best palliative care might be a solution to the prob-lem is religious belief (P < 0.0001). Conclusions: The attitudes of physicians practising pallia-tive care in Italy are not different from those reported by pre-vious studies which investigated the attitude of other health professionals. There was no agreement about whether the best palliative care might reduce requests for euthanasia by terminal patients. Key words: attitudes, cancer, ethics, euthanasia, palliative car