What is an “instruction for a substitute decision maker” (referred to today as an “advance directive”)?
A. An instruction for a substitute decision maker is a set of instructions and guidelines completed by a person, ahead of time, for his or her family and care providers to use if that person is ever ill or injured and unable to speak or make decisions about the medical treatment he or she wants to receive. “Advance health care planning is a process of learning, deciding, and talking about what health care you want in the future if you are unable to make or communicate those decision yourself. “If you are unable to make health care decisions, others will have to make these decisions for you. Unless you tell people what you want now, they will have to guess when the time comes.” — Dr. D. W. Molloy, Let Me Decide, 3rd B.C . Edition, 2005 An instruction for a substitute decision maker is a formal documentation of what you have decided based on your advance health care planning.
