ABSTRACT
This chapter attempts to contextualise Assisted Nutrition and Hydration (ANH) and shows that a case such as Oliver Leslie Burke was always likely to be raised given the manner in which ANH has come to be perceived in law and medicine. In order to maintain a patient in living-death situation, it will be necessary to provide ANH as the patient clearly is unable to feed himself. It will also probably be necessary to provide other services, such as antibiotics, which are clearly medical in nature, but the question as to whether or not ANH is medical treatment is crucial to the outcome for the patient. Following the Bland judgment, the GMC issued guidance to doctors on the cessation of life-prolonging treatment, including ANH. Purpose of ANH arguably is to keep the patient alive. It is not directly related in persistent vegetative state (PVS) cases or cases where the person is in the process of dying, to effecting a cure.
