Lack of End-of-Life Planning Leaves Immigrant’s Family on Sideline

In 2008, Ms. Nyirahabiyambere legally moved from Rwanda to the United States. She found a job with health care benefits, but then lost the benefits when she chose to move to Virginia to help her son with his children. She had a major stroke in April 2010 and has been in a persistent vegetative state since then.

After eight months in the hospital without insurance, the hospital tried to have her discharged. When it became clear that her sons were not going to make a decision regarding the removal of her feeding tube, the hospital sought a guardian to make her healthcare decisions. On February 19, guardian Andrea Sloan had the feeding tube removed because the sons couldn’t prove their mother’s wishes with regard to end-of-life care. As of March 3, Ms. Nyirahabiyambere was still alive.

Ms. Nyirahabiyambere’s sons are angry, stating that Rwandans don’t believe in starving people to death. They think that their mother would still be alive if she had money. Because their mother has been in the U.S. less than five years, she is ineligible for the Medicaid coverage that would allow her to live in a nursing home indefinitely with a feeding tube.

See Deborah Sontag, Immigrant’s Health Crisis Leaves Her Family on Sideline, N.Y. Times, Mar. 3, 2011.

Special thanks to Jim Hillhouse (WealthCounsel) for bringing this to my attention.