Professor Shinji Hamauzu.
Ethics and Clinical Philosophy,
Osaka University, Japan.
Email:
Title: From my experience of having lost two mothers
- On dying after living with dementia from a second-person perspective of a Japanese philosophical researcher -
At the beginning of February last year I lost my mother who lived in a care house for the elderly since 8 years ago because of vascular dementia, and at the end of April this year I lost my mother in law who lived in a group home for the elderly with dementia since the same years ago because of Alzheimer’s disease. Whereas my mother passed away at midnight because of acute heart failure, my mother in law passed away in the daytime because of senility (natural death).
In case of my mother, when a staff of the care house patrolled at midnight, she was sleeping without any troubles. But when the staff visited her at 6 o’clock in the morning for checking the vital signs, she had neither breathing nor beating and was already cold. Since the nurse who is working there in the daytime was not there before her working hours, the caring staff was flustered and called an ambulance. Although the ambulance came, they had nothing to do any more and contacted the police. Then the police came and examined my mother to determine the cause of death. Because they had not found any suspicion of criminal case, they said we should call her regular doctor and let him write a death certificate. The doctor diagnosed three o’clock as the assumed time of death and acute heart failure as cause of death.
In case of my mother in law, since about one year ago her amount of meal decreased step by step and since about two months ago she sometimes ate and sometimes didn’t eat. The chief of the group home asked us to bring her to a nursing home. When we applied for a nursing home, we got an answer that we must wait according to the waiting list. A month later the chief asked us again to bring her to a hospital for the elderly, because she seemed now to be going to pass away and there is neither experience nor system of accompanying the dying at this group home, so that staffs are anxious. My wife refused this proposal and wished that we want to accompany the mother to the end there by visiting her every day and staying nights if necessary. After a conversational give-and-take the chief accepted our proposal with the help of the home doctor and visiting nurses, what made us possible to give the mother a send-off with natural death.
I would like to introduce the contemporary situation in Japan on living with dementia and dying with end-of-life-care by comparing two cases of my mothers, and try to compare the situation of caring between Sweden and Japan.
Professor Shinji Hamauzu. Teaches Ethics and Clinical Philosophy at Osaka University, Japan.
Recent publications:
1. "Caring und Phänomenologie" (German), in: Phänomenologische Forschungen, Soziale Erfahrung, hrsg. von Dieter Lohmar and Dirk Fonfara, Felix Meiner, 2014.
http://www.let.osaka-u.ac.jp/~cpshama/gyouseki/Caring_Phaenomenologie_Hamauzu.pdf
2. "Towards a phenomenological Approach to the Problem of Organ Transplantation after Brain Death" (English), in: Border-Crossing, Phenomenology, Interculturality and Interdisciplinarity, Orbis Phaenomenologicus, Koenigshausen & Neumann, 2013.
http://www.let.osaka-u.ac.jp/~cpshama/gyouseki/Organtransplant_Hamauzu.pdf
3. "Towards Studies of Nordic Caring - A Different Phenomenological Approach", original Japanese version is published in: The Japanese Journal of Nursing Research , Vol.45, No.05, 2012 Aug/Sep.
http://www.let.osaka-u.ac.jp/~cpshama/gyouseki/Nordic_Caring_Hamauzu.pdf
4. "Watsujis 'Ethik' als Anthropologie. Zur Rezeption deutscher Philosophie in Japan", at the Philosophical Institute, July 17, 2012, in Heidelberg (Germany)
http://www.let.osaka-u.ac.jp/~cpshama/gyouseki/WatsujisEthik-hamauzu.pdf
5. "Narrative and Perspective", at the Conference of the Nordic Society for Phenomenology, April 25, 2009, in Tampere (Finland)
http://www.let.osaka-u.ac.jp/~cpshama/gyouseki/Narrative-Perspective(Hamauzu).pdf
6. "To the phenomenological anthropology of caring - On decision at the terminal care in Japan -", at the 2nd Conference of Applied Phenomenology, September 21, 2007, in Ritsumeikan University (Kyoto)
http://www.let.osaka-u.ac.jp/~cpshama/gyouseki/pdf/hamauzu_caring_070921.pdf