General practitioners' knowledge and use of living wills

摘要

Making medical decisions for people who are mentally incompetent, particularly at or near the end of life, is of international interest. In the United Kingdom there are no legal provisions for advance directives or living wills, but the High Court recently upheld that a patient's wishes expressed in an advanced directive are legally binding. Most of the work on the use of directives and making decisions about health care for others has focused on institutions. The promising role that living wills could have in longer term advance planning, particularly as a part of good family medical practice, has remained largely unexplored.