Suggestions, Not Demands: Rethinking Living Wills

Studies suggest that doctors do what families want despite what the living will might say. Given the inherent problems with living wills (predicting what it will really be like for you and your family when the time arrives) this is a good thing. Rather than trying to make living wills more enforceable, the essay argues that we write a letter to our family, indicating our current feelings and dealing with some of the problems that get in the way: family guilt and physicians' fear of liablity for too much pain mediacation and too little heoric intervention. It also suggests that family members sign off on the living will thus assuring that it will be discussed - the real value of living wills are the family conversations they can trigger.