Advance Health Directive
You may want to set out your wishes for future health care and treatment, in the event that something happened to you. An Advance Health Directive (AHD) is the legal document which allows you to do that in Queensland. In other parts of Australia, it is also sometimes referred to as a living will, advance care directive or a medical power of attorney.
An Advance Health Directive comes into effect if you were to lose capacity, such as if you were in a coma or lacked the mental capacity to properly understand and make decisions.
A valid Advance Health Directive document allows you to set out what your preferred medical treatment is and to provide relevant information about your medical histories, such as allergies, or religious and cultural beliefs. This means that your doctor can know all of the information that you want them to know, if you did not have the capacity to tell them directly at the time you were obtaining medical treatment. Your Advance Health Directive tells the doctors what medical treatment you agree or disagree with if you cannot tell them yourself.
For instance, you can direct whether you receive palliative care, medical treatment or other life sustaining treatment if you are diagnosed with a terminal condition, are in a coma or permanently unconscious or remain in a persistent vegetative state.
To properly prepare an Advance Health Directive (AHD), you need to take the form to your doctor and have it completed with them. This is so a doctor can explain to you the options available and ensure that your wishes are made with proper professional advice as to the implications if you were to opt in or out of specific care.
We also recommend that you see a Succession Planning Lawyer as well to ensure that the document is legally binding and valid. This ensures that you have capacity to make the care decisions which you have set out in the form, and to ensure your personal matters are properly accounted for when you sign off.
It is part of our professional advice to advise you as to whether the documents are legally binding and valid, the forms are completed properly and all other statutory requirements have been complied with.
Advance Health Directive FAQ’s
Can I use my Advance Health Directive to permit voluntary euthanasia?
How is an Advance Health Directive different to an Enduring Power of Attorney?
An Enduring Power of Attorney is a legal form which allows you to appoint a person or persons to make decisions for you about health matters and communicate this to your medical practitioner, on your behalf, if you are unable to make those decisions yourself. An Advance Health Directive allows you to complete the form and tell the medical practitioner directly in the form what health care treatment and care you would or would not like to receive. It is effectively your consent for those medical treatments, life sustaining or otherwise to be completed or not completed in the event of illness or injury.
We recommend you have both an Enduring Power of Attorney and an Advance Health Directive. If there are decisions which you have not provided for in your Advance Health Directive, then you can nominate a decision maker to make those decisions on your behalf if you are unable to make them.
Who can make an Advance Health Directive?
Can I revoke or change an AHD?
What sort of information should I include in an AHD?
What happens if I do not have an AHD?
If you pass away without an Advance Health Directive then the person you have nominated as decision makers for health/personal matters in an Enduring Power of Attorney is able to discuss your matters with health professionals and make decisions on your behalf. However, if you do not have an Attorney appointed for health/personal matters, then a family member can apply to the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal to be appointed an attorney. Alternatively, in Queensland, doctors can speak with your next of kin to ascertain what decisions should be made.
However, without advance health directives in place, you cannot be certain that what medical care you would want or not want in the event of illness or injury will happen. You are trusting that your family will make decisions in accordance with your wishes, when you do not have a voice to share those wishes or preferences at the time.
When should I update my Advance Health Directive?
As with most succession planning documents, we recommend that you review your Advance Health Directive every 3-5 years to ensure it is accurate and up to date with your values and preferences, and accords with what decisions you would make and would instruct a doctor to perform or not perform if something was to happen to you.
Equally, if your preferences or other instructions of what you would want were to change from that contained within the Advance Health Directive, we recommend you review and update the directive.
If you suffer from an illness or injury, then the last valid Advance Health Directive will be used.
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