Making Advance Healthcare Decisions is becoming more common. I spend a lot of time talking about death, dying or loss of capacity with my clients. One thing has become really clear which is that not many of us want to linger. It is rare for me to meet with someone who hopes for a long and drawn out death. Lots of my elderly clients have really strong feelings about this. They simply don’t want to be kept alive at all costs.
It’s a really personal decision, of course and people will have different thoughts and opinions. However, I do find that generally people want some kind of control over the care they receive. This can be more important to those who are seriously ill or dying.
If you don’t do anything about those thoughts, decisions are left to health care providers, who may or may not know you. Most of us agree what a great job doctors do but they have difficult decisions to make daily, sometimes about patients they have never met. What can you do to give yourself some control over future healthcare?
How can I make decisions if I have lost capacity?
You can certainly look at a Health & Welfare Power of Attorney. If you have someone you really trust and can have an open and honest conversation with them, these can be a vital help. You choose an attorney who can make health decisions on your behalf when you are no longer able to. Your attorney should know what you feel about treatment and the more you can tell them about the choices you would prefer to make, the better.
If you aren’t able to make decisions, your attorney can step in and make those decisions for you. That is why it is essential to pick the right attorney to act on your behalf.
Advance Decisions.
Making Advance Health Care decisions does require careful thought. Take care in setting up the documents although you can do them yourselves. They need to be quite specific and may need input from your doctor. I personally charge only a nominal sum for these as I feel quite strongly about them. They don’t just help the patient but also their relatives, who are able to see in writing exactly how their family member would want to be treated.
If you are making your own advance decision and just want a bit of friendly advice, I am happy to offer this for free. Just give me a call on 07922 231032 or email nikk@respectwills.co.uk. Of find information on Age UK.
https://www.ageuk.org.uk/information-advice/money-legal/legal-issues/advance-decisions
Another incredibly useful but lesser known is the Advance Decision. Here, you Make Advance Healthcare Decisions, so you are the one in control. You decide, while you are well, how you would like to be treated if you aren’t able to make decisions about your health care in the future. You could say, for example, that you don’t want chemo if your cancer is stage 4. Or you could refuse to be force fed. Perhaps you want to refuse resuscitation in situations where you are unlikely to recover. There is a lot of scope to make healthcare decisions and retain some sort of control.