Supporting irrational suicide

In this essay, we present three case studies which suggest that sometimes we are better off supporting a so-called irrational suicide, and that emotional or psychological distress - even if medically controllable - might justify a suicide. We underscore how complicated these decisions are and how murky a physician's moral role can be. We advocate a more individualized route to end-of-life care, eschewing well-meaning, principled, generalizations in favor of a highly contextualized, patient-centered, approach. We conclude that our Western traditions of promoting reasoned behavior and life themselves may at times be counter-productive.