A New Miracle Machine Can Keep You Alive Even When Your Heart Stops
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Q. My husband, Phil, and I have been married for thirty years. We were faced with a heart-wrenching situation recently, when Phil’s father had a heart attack and was on life support in the hospital. He didn’t have an Advance Medical Directive in place, and Phil’s mother was faced with a difficult decision about what to do, and Phil did not agree with his mother’s decision, which involved keeping Phil’s
dad alive using a new life saving measure called ECMO.
The painful situation prompted us to start discussing our own wishes and thinking about getting our estate planning and incapacity planning documents in place, so we can decide what happens if we are ever in a similar situation. If Phil or I have a terminal condition, neither of us would want to be kept alive using any extraordinary measures, especially something like ECMO.
According to the doctors (who Phil’s mom went along with), ECMO is a “miracle machine” that helped prolong Phil’s father’s life. But based on what we observed, ECMO seems like a stupendous waste of time, money, and medical resources. Can you tell us more about ECMO, and if it’s something you can include in our advance medical directives to ensure that we will never be subject to this so-called miracle
machine?
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Critter Corner: What is a POLST Form and Does it Replace an Advance Directive?
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When reading about Advance Medical Directives, I saw something about a POLST form. What exactly is that, and if we have one, do we need an Advance Directive also?
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