Many people, especially those who are healthy, do not think of what would happen if they should suddenly fall ill or become injured in a serious accident. But this topic is far more important than most people in my age group think.
We recently had an experience in the hospital where a 25 year old man went down at home, he was revived by paramedics, and brought to the hospital. After a few days on life support, he was declared brain dead. His fiancee, whom he had been with for several years, wanted to withdraw care and let him go, as she knew that this was the decision he would have wanted to make. However, he did not have an advanced directive to appoint a power of attorney or living will, so the decision legally went to his mother whom he was not close with. His mother couldn’t bear the thought of her son passing away, so she refused to let the hospital withdraw the life support. He laid in the bed for several days before physicians stepped in and told her that it was not ethical to keep his body going with the ventilator and other supportive equipment.
We, as nurses, had several conversations with his fiancee and she confided with us her frustration. Her and her fiance had actually had the conversation about “being a vegetable” after seeing a story on the news. They both vowed that they never wanted to lay in a hospital bed in that exact condition. But, because they never filled out an advanced directive (and weren’t legally married), she had no say on this decision. With just a few signatures, this situation could have become slightly less stressful on the fiancee.
Below you will find links to the PDFs provided by the State of Arizona to easily fill out your living will and healthcare power of attorney forms (at absolutely no cost to you). The living will is a document that discusses only “deathbed” decisions, while the healthcare power of attorney appoints one person to make all medical decisions for you, limited by decisions you made in your living will.
So, take a few minutes to print out the attached forms, take some time talking with your loved ones, and fill out the forms. Each form requires a notary to verify the signature, and most banks offer a free notary service when you use their company for banking. Many libraries also offer notary service, so make a quick phone call to find out. After you have filled out your forms, you can choose to file them with the State of Arizona’s Advanced Directive Registry (the pdf with instructions is below). This registry keeps your forms online, easily assessable to anyone you choose to give your password to. You can also choose to give copies of your advanced directives to your loved ones in case your find yourself in an unthinkable situation.
Living Will Form
Healthcare Power of Attorney Form
AZ Advanced Directives Registry Instructions
Approximately 5 million people in the United States have been diagnosed with heart failure, and about 300,000 people die each year from this disease (according to Medline). Heart failure is when the heart is unable to pump an adequate amount of blood to the body, often due to coronary artery disease, high blood pressure, and diabetes. Symptoms of heart failure include blood and fluid backing up into the lungs causing shortness of breath, blood and fluid backing up in the extremities causing swelling or edema, and quick onset fatigue.
The last two weeks at the hospital have been insane. We’re a 28 bed ICU; in the winter months, we generally have about 18-24 patients at a time and in the summer months we generally have 8-12 patients (due to the snow birds we have visiting during the desert winters). Well, it’s currently the beginning of August and we have had 20 patients on several days in the last few weeks. We don’t have as many staff members in the summertime because staff are allowed (and encouraged) to take their vacation days during our slower months and the hospitals hire travelers in the wintertime to accomodate the increase. So, having a winter-like census during the summer months is a struggle as far as staffing goes.
At the last
A few of my coworkers and I drove up to Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas last week to attend the Critical Care Nursing Symposium, which is put on by
I’m really glad that I went to the nursing conference. It was actually my first out of state conference, which was a great experience to talk to other nurses in other parts of the country and learn what they were doing on their units and what issues they were facing. It was also a great break/vacation as Las Vegas is a great place to go for any reason. While we were in bed by 10pm the night before each of the conference days to be awake and attentive, but the night after the conference we had the chance to go out and experience the city. (Photo: That’s me in the middle, Erica on the left and Melissa on the right)