Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital

An irregular, gasping type of breathing that often occurs among patients who are unconscious and near death, agonal breathing figures in the investigation into Dr. Anna Pou. Her use of morphine to treat critically ill patients exhibiting agonal breathing becomes a source of controversy, as it’s likely that agonal breathers—their respiration controlled by their brain stems, their brains’ cortexes too starved of oxygen to function—are quite unable to feel pain

Cheyne-Stokes breathing, a “revving and stalling pattern” (299), occurs near death and is given as a reason Dr. Pou drugs certain seriously ill patients who then die. However, Cheyne-Stokes also occurs in patients with brain or heart damage who are merely asleep.

Euthanasia is the act of ending a person’s life to relieve their pain and suffering. Medical professionals generally consider euthanasia unacceptable and immoral, and most jurisdictions outlaw it, but in recent decades it has won support from advocates who favor that choice as an option during end-of-life care. Euthanasia is central to the investigation of the many suspicious deaths at Memorial hospital during the Katrina disaster. Evidence points toward an active decision by doctors to euthanize the most seriously ill patients, who, the doctors believe, are unlikely to be rescued.