The article entitled:
Enough - The Failure of the Living Will, is posted on The Hastings Center website. (see comment following this post)
This article points out the sad fact that
almost no one (in the general public) has a living will, sometimes called an advance directive for healthcare (although the Advance Directive for Healthcare usually includes assignment of an agent or possibly a Power of Attorney). Thus, states the article, what is the use of spending so much time and effort to promote their use. Just give up and promote Durable Power of Attorney's.
The issue in this document is summed up, "In pursuit of the dream that patients' exercise of autonomy could extend beyond their span of competence, living wills (advance directives) have passed from controversy to conventional wisdom, to widely promoted policy. But the policy has not produced results, and should be abandoned".
Another statement says, "In an attempt to extend patients' exercise of autonomy beyond their span of competence, resources have been lavished to make living wills routine and even universal. This policy has not produced results that recompense its costs, and should therefore be renounced."
Does the Document recommend eliminating the use of Advance Directives? No! The article states: "We do not propose the elimination of living wills (advance directives for healthcare). We can imagine recommending them to patients whose medical situation is plain, whose crisis is imminent, whose preferences are specific, strong, and delineable (able to be explained) and who have special reasons to prescribe their care."
Hence for patients who have a specific, strong and explainable special reasons to accept or reject specific treatments the authors recommend the benefits of advance directives (living wills) in conjunction with appointment of a healthcare agent who will handle decisions for matters not covered by the Advance Directive.
Looks like the Jehovah's Witness population will continue to use Advance Directives that assign an Agent to clearly delineate their specific and strongly held preferences.
[Watch for more information on the definition and value of Advance Directives soon to be posted here at NoBlood]
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The Hastings Center - The Hastings Center is an independent, nonpartisan, and nonprofit bioethics research institute founded in 1969 to explore fundamental and emerging questions in health care, biotechnology, and the environment. Link -
http://www.thehastingscenter.org/
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