FYI: IT STARTED innocently. A doctor’s visit. A blood test. Results. Admit to hospital for “a couple days of observation” that instead cascaded, over six days, into my husband’s death at age 71. His death certificate states “etiology unknown.” While doctors suspected prescribed medication, we will never know just what caused his liver to fail.
Throughout, the situation had been confusing. Clarity regarding treatment options—and the likely outcome from procedures—were in short supply. He and I and doctors made medical decisions in the face of this uncertainty and without regard to costs. Crucially useful was my husband’s advance medical directive, completed a decade earlier when we updated our wills. I kept this at hand to reference as we made decisions. Language in directives is ambiguous and can be a poor fit to clinical decisions. Yet the directive was essential to working through differences of opinion among family members and to obtaining, in the final hours, a frank assessment from attending doctors and clinicians.
Regards,
Ted
https://humbledollar.com/2019/11/at-end/
