Doctors face uncharted territory with doctor assisted suicide ruling

This ruling will reduce suffering. It will allow people to actually live longer because they will have the peace of mind that they will not have a horrible death.Steven Fletcher, Conservative MP

Steven Fletcher is among those applauding the Supreme Court's landmark ruling last Friday, which paves the way for physician-assisted suicide in Canada. The Conservative MP had introduced his own private members bill seeking to change the law.

And now the highest court in the land has spoken -- and given federal and provincial governments one year to craft new legislation.

Whatever they come up with, the law will have to acknowledge that competent adults enduring intolerable suffering from irrecoverable medical conditions, will have the right to ask a doctor to help them end their life. It will lead to a lot of weighty conversations inside Canadian families ... And it will mean an entirely new dimension in the relationship between physicians and patients.

So, as lawmakers get to work on changing the books, we brought together three doctors to see how they're preparing themselves.

• John Turnbull is a neurologist and the head of the the ALS Clinic at the McMaster University Medical Centre. He was in Hamilton, Ontario.

• Ingrid DeKock is a palliative care doctor and the Physician Lead for the Palliative Community Consult Team for the Edmonton Zone Palliative Care Program. She was in Edmonton.

• Mike Evans is a family physician at St. Michael's Hospital and the Founder of The Health Design Lab. He was in Toronto.

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This segment was produced by The Current's Kristin Nelson, Lara O'Brien and Sujata Berry.