|
Advance Directives
Getting Started:
You have a right to make informed decisions about your own healthcare, but if you have a serious illness, you may not understand your treatment options or be able to communicate your wishes to your doctor. In these circumstances, family members can help make decisions about your health care. By preparing documents called advance directives, you can let your family and physician know what kind of treatment you want to receive, based on your values and beliefs.
Questions to Ask Yourself:
Are you willing to leave to chance the person chosen to make decisions for you?
- Will this person make the decisions that you wanted made?
- Will this person know that you are counting on him or her to makedecisions?
There is a way to make sure that your wishes are known to your loved ones and health care professionals. It starts with conversations with your loved ones about your healthcare decisions and ends with the completion of an advance directive.
The purpose of this information is to get you started in preparing an Advance Directive. Spoken words get changed from person to person. Written words do not change and people can go back and read them again.
Whether you are young, middle aged, or elderly, in good health or poor health, talking with your family is a good idea. With an Advance Directive your family members, significant others and close friends can be spared the agony and uncertainty of whether or not they are making the right decision on your behalf.
The Meaning of "Life-Support Treatment"
Life-support treatment means any medical procedure, device or medication to keep me alive. Life-support treatment includes: medical devices to help you breathe (Mechanical Respiratory Support); food and water supplied artificially by medical device (tube feeding); cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR); major surgery; blood transfusions; and antibiotics.
What Is An Advance Directive?
An advance directive is a form that tells your doctor and your family members what kind of care you would like to have if you become unable to make medical decisions. It's called an advance directive because you choose your medical care before you become seriously ill.
When you are admitted to a hospital, the staff will tell you about advance directives. The laws about advance directives are different in each state. Ask your doctor what the laws for advance directives are in Arkansas. An advance directive lets you say you don't want a certain treatment, such as cardiopulmonary resuscitation (also called CPR). An advance directive can also say that you do want certain treatments, like medicine for pain, or intravenous fluids and tube feedings.
What Is a Healthcare Proxy?
An advance directive also lets you name someone, like your spouse or another close family member, to make decisions for you if you lose your ability to communicate. This is called a Healthcare Proxy or a Durable Power of Attorney for Healthcare, and it lets you name someone to make medical decisions for you if you are unconscious or unable to make medical decisions for any reason.
Who Needs An Advance Directive?
Most advance directives are written by older people or by people who are seriously ill. For example, a patient in the last stages of a critical disease might write an advance directive that says he/she does not want to be put on an artificial respirator if he/she stops breathing. By letting his/her doctor know ahead of time that he/she does not want a respirator, he/she may be able to reduce his/her suffering at the end of life and increase his/her control over his/her death. It may give him/her peace of mind to know that his/her doctor knows his/her wishes and that he/she will not be put on a respirator if he/she stops breathing.
Can An Advance Directive Be Made for Another Person?
If the patient is under age 18, a legal guardian can make an advance directive. If the patient is an adult who can no longer make medical decisions, a legal guardian can make an advance directive for the patient. Next of kin are consulted about decisions when no advance directive exists.
How Do You Make an Advance Directive?
To make an advance directive, please contact your nurse. You may use a form provided by this hospital or another healthcare provider. If you have decided to name a Healthcare Proxy, fill out the Proxy Directive. Two witnesses (over age 21 and not your proxy) must sign the directive.
What if You Change Your Mind?
Your advance directive can be revoked at any time by telling your doctor and family members that your wishes have changed. All copies of the directive to be revoked should be destroyed.
Advance Directive:
The Kind of Medical Treatment I Want or Do Not Want
I believe that my life is precious and I deserve to be treated with dignity. When the time comes that I am very sick and not able to speak for myself, or if I should have an incurable or irreversible condition that will cause my death within a relatively short time, and I am no longer able to make decisions regarding my medical treatment, I direct my attending physician, pursuant to the Arkansas Rights of the Terminally Ill or Permanently Unconscious Act, to respect the wishes and instructions in this advance directive when withholding or withdrawing treatment that only prolongs the process of dying and is not necessary for my comfort or to alleviate pain.
It is the policy of White River Health System to respect patients' rights to refuse unwanted treatment and to comply with any valid advance directive.
|
