Chapter 7-1 Introduction

• Jurisdiction: United States

7-1 Introduction

Advance directives (sometimes called medical advance directives) instruct an individual's family members, caregivers, and medical practitioners about the person's health care and end-of-life choices in the event the person suffers from mental incapacity and is unable to act on his or her own behalf. If at some point the individual does become incapacitated, the family members, caregivers, and medical practitioners should act in accordance with the wishes expressed by the now-incapacitated person in the advance directives. With people living longer and with diseases like Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia being more prominent, the likelihood that any individual senior citizen will need advance directives is almost certain. It is important, therefore, that lawyers who practice Elder Law acquire a sound understanding of the laws governing the preparation, execution, and implementation of advance directives.

As we discovered in Chapter 4, the march toward advance directives for patients was driven by two events: the passage by Congress of the Patient Self-Determination Act (PSDA) in 1990¹ and the development of the doctrine of informed...