About Advance Directives
These questions and answers will help you understand how you or someone you love may benefit from our creating an Advance Directive.
What Is an Advance Directive?
Advance Directives are legal documents where you write down how you want your health care handled if you can no longer make or communicate decisions. You may also use an Advance Directive to appoint a person other than yourself to make health care decisions for you. There are two types of Advance Directives: Living Will and Health Care Proxy (Durable Power of Attorney for Health Care).
What Are Living Wills and Health Care Proxies?
Living Wills and Health Care Proxies (Durable Power of Attorney for Health Care) are both legal documents that function as Advance Directives.
- A Living Will is a legal document completed by you that lets you tell your doctor what care you do or do not want if you are diagnosed with a terminal condition or become permanently unconscious and are unlikely to recover. You may choose to decline treatment that prolongs the dying process.
- A Health Care Proxy (Durable Power of Attorney for Health Care) is a legal document completed by you that identifies the person you want to make your health care decisions if you are unable to make them for yourself. You can say what health care decisions you want made for you and what those decisions should be.
How Do I Prepare an Advance Directive?
- Forms to complete both types of Advance Directives (Living Will and/or Health Care Proxy) are available from hospitals, doctors, nurses, social workers, advocacy organizations, and on the State of New Jersey Department of Health website. An attorney may also help you prepare your Advance Directive.
- A Health Care Proxy must be signed and dated by you. It is recommended that it also be notarized in case you travel out of state. The person you choose to make health care decisions for you should be someone you trust. It can’t be: your doctor; an employee of your doctor; or an administrator, owner, or employee of a health care facility in which you live or are a patient (unless the person is also your spouse, adult child, or sibling).
I Change My Advance Directive?
- You may change or cancel your Living Will or Health Care Proxy by destroying all copies, putting your changes in writing, and by telling your family, attorney, and anyone else who may be involved in your health care. You must tell your doctor of any changes or they may not be effective.
I Still Have Questions. Who Can I Speak With?
- AARP (American Association of Retired Persons), (888) 687-2277
- Legal Services of New Jersey: (888) 576-5529. Legal Services of New Jersey provides free legal assistance to low income people in New Jersey.
For more information on Health Care Decision Making, please contact:
- NJ Office of the Ombudsman, (877) 582-6995
- The American Bar Association
- State of New Jersey Department of Health
