Table 1.

Attitudes to ending life: levels of agreement with action described (n=400)

Strongly disagree	Disagree	Neither agree nor disagree	Agree	Strongly agree	Mean*
1. Mrs X is medically well. She is deemed competent. She wishes for the ventilator to be withdrawn. The consulting physician switches off the ventilator.
9%	20%	13%	44%	14%	3.33
2. Mrs X is medically well. She is deemed competent. She wishes to die. She asks her consulting physician to help her die. The physician agrees to assist death by personally, slowly, increasing her morphine dose.
21%	36%	15%	23%	5%	2.54
3. Mrs X develops a chest infection. She falls into septic shock and eventually into a coma. The doctors on ICU agree that she is brain dead and consult the family to switch off the ventilator. The consulting physician switches off the ventilator.
3%	6%	11%	51%	29%	3.97
4. Mrs X is medically well. She is deemed competent. She wishes to die. She asks her consulting physician to help her die. The physician agrees to assist death personally administering a lethal injection of potassium chloride.
36%	35%	13%	13%	3%	2.12
5. Mrs X is medically well. She has severe cognitive impairment as a result of her disease. She wishes for the ventilator to be withdrawn. The consulting physician switches off the ventilator.
16%	38%	23%	20%	3%	2.56
Yes			No
6.  Do you think you, as a doctor, could administer a lethal injection (eg potassium chloride) to a competent patient, like Mrs X, who wishes to die? (Please again assume that such an action is legal.)**
24%			76%

*5 means high agreement; 1 means high disagreement

**Three respondents did not answer