Hospital patient.
Born at Vegreville, Alberta on 20 June 1923 to Fanny Golfman and Nathan Golobchuk, he grew up there and spent his early years in Edmonton and Estevan, and at Hoffer, Hirsch, and Sonnenfeld colonies. During the Second World War, he enlisted in the Canadian Army and served overseas in Holland and England. He then ran a small grocery store in Portage la Prairie, and later moved to Winnipeg to work for Joseph Wolinsky, founder of Dominion Electric, and then at Acklands (now Grainger) industrial suppliers, before his retirement.
He was an active congregant and former Gabbai of the Talmud Torah, Beth Jacob Synagogue. On 1 June 2008, he was the honouree of the 7th Annual Fundraising Dinner of the Synagogue. With his wife Dora “Goldie” Golubchuk (1920-1974), he had two children.
It was upon him falling severely ill with pneumonia in late 2007, while a resident in a long-term care facility, that he became the centre of a controversy that was covered by local, national, and international media. Not long after he was admitted to the Grace Hospital Intensive Care Unit, physicians told his Orthodox Jewish family there was no point in keeping him on the respirator and feeding tube that were keeping him alive—his chances of recovery were zero percent, they said. But the family refused on religious grounds, insisting that he be allowed to die a natural death. Doctors told the family they planned to unhook him anyway. The family decided to take them to court. On 13 February 2008, a Manitoba judge sided with the Golubchuk family and extended an interim injunction preventing doctors from withdrawing care until a full trial could be heard in September. His case became contentious in the court of public opinion, with human rights groups taking sides, and among those in the medical field.
Eventually, two of his doctors—Anand Kumar and David Easton—and ICU director Bojan Paunovic announced in May and June 2008 that they could no longer ethically justify treating Golubchuk, citing deep concerns about the continuing painful treatment of ulcerative sores that had developed on his skin, on top of the unlikelihood of his recovery. A new physician was found to care for him but, on 24 June 2008, Golubchuk died at the Grace Hospital “of natural causes.” He was buried in the Shaarey Zedek Cemetery.
The family hoped that the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority would follow up on the experience by instituting a review process by which cases such as this would be officially and quickly examined and ruled on. The WRHA’s response, in a report issued in 2011, was to launch a public education program that would see doctors and nurses encourage patients who come to hospital, even for short term problems, to fill out health-care directives specifying the level of care they would want. The health authority would also increase access to mediation and ethics support for families so that disputes over care could be settled before they ended up in court. The idea of a formal review panel was not addressed, to the disappointment of the Golubchuk family.
“Winnipeg man a centre of end-of-life controversy dies,” CBC News, 25 June 2008.
“End-of-life war outlives Golubchuk,” National Review of Medicine, July 2008.
Obituary, Winnipeg Free Press, 1 August 2008.
“End of life report fails: Golubchuk family,” CBC News, 28 March 2011.
“Solomon ‘Sam’ Golubchuk,” FindAGrave.
This page was prepared by Lois Braun.
Page revised: 13 December 2024
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