Doctors who support the legalisation of assisted suicide are more likely to withdraw or withhold treatment from dying patients, a study has found.

Actively helping someone to die remains illegal in Britain but more than a third of GPs and hospital doctors report making decisions which they expected would accelerate the death of a terminally-ill patient.

A significant minority — 7 per cent — said that they had taken steps such as withdrawing medications, foods or fluid, with the intention of hastening a patient’s death.

But doctors who actively support a change in the law to allow assisted suicide are up to 40 per cent more likely to take such actions, a new analysis has found.

By contrast, doctors who reported strong religious beliefs or who actively opposed to changing the law were less likely to intervene to quicken the dying process.

The study of nearly 3,000 doctors’ attitudes was conducted by Clive Seale, a professor of medical sociology at Queen Mary, University of London, and published online last week in the journal of Social Science and Medicine.

GPs, hospital doctors and specialists in palliative and intensive care medicine were all asked to answer an anonymous questionnaire, reporting on the last patient they attended who died.

Preliminary findings from the survey showed last year that 29 per cent of doctors said they had made decisions which they expected to hasten death, but were not specifically intended to do so.

A further 7 per cent of all respondents said they made such decisions with the “explicit” or “partial” intention of hastening death.

But the new analysis found that this proportion rose to nearly 18 per cent among those who supported the legalisation of assisted suicide, and to 11 per cent among those who reported having no religious belief.

This compares with just 3.4 per cent of doctors who strongly oppose a change in the law on assisted suicide, or 4.5 per cent of those who reported religious faith.

Guidelines for care at the end of life emphasise that doctors should always act in a patient’s best interests and within the law, which prohibits euthanasia or actively helping someone to kill themselves.

But doctors also attempt to make patients comfortable or avoid unnecessary interventions in their last days and hours. This could include removing treatment such as antibiotics or life-supporting ventilation, supplying painkillers or sedatives or deciding not to attempt cardio-pulmonary resuscitation if a patient falls unconscious.

The survey revealed that decisions were more likely to be made by doctors treating a patient in hospital, particularly in intensive care units. They were less likely when doctors were treating a patient in care homes and hospices.

Male doctors, those were not palliative care specialists or who had a “neutral” attitude to religion were also more likely to intend to hasten death, the survey found.

But where doctors acted to hasten death, they did so with the consent of the patient or their families, and when they believed further treatments would be futile.

Professor Seale added that a doctor’s views on assisted suicide or the sanctity of life appeared to have an effect on their clinical practice.

“Doctors who say they have a religious faith are less likly to take decisions which they partly or wholly intended to hasten death. Likewise, if you are opposed to legalising assisted dying, you are less likely to take these steps” he said.

“But it is possible for non-religious doctors or the minority who support a change in the law, their inhibitions may be looser towards withholding or withdrawing treatment.”

Two thirds of doctors polled said they were moderately or strongly opposed to legalising assisted suicide.

But surveys suggest that up to 85 per cent of the general public would like the option to take steps to end their own lives or allow others to do so if they became seriously ill or disabled or were experiencing intolerable suffering.

Simon Chapman, director of policy at the National Council for Palliative Care, called for core training in palliative medicine to be mandatory for all health and social care professionals, so that all dying patients could receive the same standard of high quality care.

“At the moment too many professionals are having to provide care for dying people without having had sufficient training.

He added: “It is reassuring that although there are some differences in the way that individual doctors approach these issues, this research indicates that vulnerable groups of people are not being treated differently from other patients.”

Explore Health News

• Swine flu

Times Recommends

• How I lost the gift of joy for a while
• Why Ann Widdecombe has got it wrong
• Alas, it’s the end of the road for petrolheads