While under sedation, the patient is breathing independently as usual. Sedation is one option that can be used to treat the symptoms of a dying patient, and the purpose is to neither hasten nor postpone death. Unlike sedation, euthanasia means deliberately causing death.
Situations where sedation can be used occur at the end of life, so the patient is likely to pass away while under sedation. Sedation does not affect the patient’s death – they would have died with or without sedation. Thanks to sedation, the patient’s death is peaceful. If the patient has the life expectancy to justify it and their symptoms become manageable by other means while under sedation, the sedation can also be a short-term solution.