Tips for writing an advance care directive

By Charles Corke, Associate Professor of Medicine, Deakin University

Advances in medical technology have dramatically altered the process of dying. It’s now possible to prolong life, with the frightening reality that this may simply extend our dying process.

Advance care planning is designed to empower us to retain some control over the last stages of our life by communicating our wishes about what we want, or don’t want, in terms of medical treatment. Generally this planning is done in well in advance of a medical crisis, while people are well.

However, evidence suggests these plans may not work as intended in a crisis, because the message the patient thought to be crystal clear appears unclear to doctors and family.

Let’s go through an example

The following is a mix of several similar real world patients, but names and some specific details have been altered to avoid identifying any particular case.