A family in Canada alleges that their 83-year-old grandmother was euthanised against her wishes and that she did not have the capacity to consent.
Brigitte Stegemann, 83, died on July 10, 2026. She had been diagnosed with stage IV stomach cancer about five months before her death, and had lived in a long-term care facility for two years, her family wrote in a July 21 post on Facebook.
Stegemann, whom her family described as a “beloved mother, grandmother and great-grandmother”, was called “GG”, said the post. Her granddaughter, Bridgette Kranendonk, served as her power of attorney and was her grandmother’s primary contact for medical decisions.
About two months before Stegemann died, doctors at the care home discussed the possibility of ending her life via euthanasia, said her family.
In Canada, unlike in the United States, a “medically assisted” death – known colloquially as “MAID” – is typically administered by a physician, as it was in Stegemann’s case. This practice is illegal in the United States, which requires a person seeking to die to self-administer the lethal drugs.
“At that time, GG clearly stated that she did not wish to pursue it. As a devout Christian, she explicitly expressed that MAID conflicted with her personal beliefs and faith,” they explained.
After this conversation, Kranendonk and her husband went on holiday, and they say doctors took advantage of her absence to have conversations with Stegemann about MAID. These discussions were concealed from Kranendonk, the post claims.
“This blatant omission was the first major warning sign for our family. Given Brigitte’s long-standing role as GG’s advocate and Power of Attorney, it is indefensible that discussions about such a life-altering decision occurred entirely behind her back during that brief 10-day window, despite the home’s daily communication with her on far less significant matters,” said the post.
Later, during additional discussions about MAID, the family says they were “met with an immediate wall of defensiveness”, and informed that staff members of the care home had met with Stegemann twice during Kranendonk’s 10-day holiday to discuss MAID. A nurse at the facility, the family alleges, said she was “advocating for [Stegemann]” by starting the MAID process.
Despite the family’s objections and concerns about Stegemann’s ability to understand what was happening, a doctor proceeded with a competency evaluation.
The doctor, referred to in the post as “Dr K”, deemed Stegemann competent despite Stegemann not knowing how many siblings she had, whether they were alive or dead, and reportedly becoming “completely disoriented and distressed” during the questioning.
“Dr K then explained MAID to GG in specific terms, describing it, to the best of our recollection, as receiving medication, feeling peace, falling asleep, and explicitly promising GG that she ‘would not lose control of her bowels’,” something the family found deeply unsettling.
“For an elderly individual of GG’s demographic background and cognitive capacity, ‘medication’ was a term conceptually linked entirely to healing, care and relief,” they wrote. Stegemann’s euthanasia was set for July 10.
“Legally and structurally, the formal written application for MAID must be signed by the patient and independently witnessed before final clinical assessments take place and a date for death is set,” said the family. They claim this was “completely inverted” and that the death date was scheduled before any paperwork was filled out.
Dr K, the family claims, took advantage of a condition in the law to schedule Stegemann’s death despite the protests of her power of attorney and past disapproval of MAID by deeming her mentally capable during the assessment.
Kranendonk said that once she informed Stegemann that she would be dying on July 10, she was “confused and visibly distressed”, and “wept for an extended period, repeatedly stating that she had made a mistake”. Kranendonk told her grandmother that “if she had changed her mind, she had the absolute right to tell the medical team on Friday that she did not want to proceed”.
This, the family said, did not happen – and they were actually asked to “actively participate” in their grandmother’s euthanasia by handing medical supplies to doctors.
At the time of her death, the family claims “GG was silent, her hands tightly clasped together in a fixed prayer position”, and “never provided a verbal response” to the doctor who would euthanise her.
“Our family had been strictly assured that GG would be asked for a final, explicit verbal confirmation on the day of the procedure to ensure she still wished to proceed. When GG remained completely silent and gave no response, Brigitte felt a sudden wave of relief and a big smile came over her face, believing that the procedure would finally be halted because the strict requirement for final consent had not been met,” said the post.
“Tragically, we were left alarmed and horrified when the clinical team completely ignored her silence and carried the procedure forward regardless.”
Stegemann was then euthanised.
The family said they did not attempt to legally halt the scheduled euthanasia as they believed that Stegemann would have to verbally consent to her death.
“We trusted that this mandatory legal safeguard would protect her. We never could have anticipated that when she remained entirely silent, the clinical team would simply ignore the law and push the medication anyway,” they said.
The family is speaking out, saying that doctors took advantage of a vulnerable patient who said that MAID was a violation of her faith.
“Once a vulnerable patient explicitly declines this path, the facility should never have targeted her for re-evaluation behind closed doors while her primary advocate was away – especially when the facility had no trouble contacting Brigitte daily for minor, routine care decisions,” said the post.
In Canada, MAID accounted for 5 per cent of all deaths in 2024, said the government’s annual report.
