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Physicians often disregard patient directives when making end-of-life decisions

Case Management Weekly, August 2, 2004

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When presented with hypothetical patient cases, physicians commonly made end-of-life treatment decisions that were inconsistent with the patients' advance directives. The study's authors devised six hypothetical cases describing patients with serious, life-threatening diseases who have also lost their decision-making capacity. Each case included an explicit advance directive from the patient on end-of-life care.

Sixty-five percent of physicians who answered the survey made treatment decisions that were not consistent with patients' advance wishes. The study's authors say that while advance directives begin the dialogue between patient and doctor about the end-of-life, improvements to conflict resolution between family, patients and physicians, and end-of-life decision making is still necessary.

Source: Archives of Internal Medicine

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