National Healthcare Decisions Day

[16 April 2008 - U.S. Administration on Aging] National Healthcare Decisions Day (NHDD) is on Wednesday, April 16th. This nationwide initiative is designed to raise public awareness of the need to plan ahead for health care decisions and to encourage the use of advance directives to communicate important health care decisions. NHDD is a collaborative effort of national, state and community organizations committed to ensuring that all adults with decision-making capacity in the United States have the information and opportunity to communicate and document their healthcare decisions. Several aging services network organizations are currently participating in NHDD. Making end of life decisions can be an extremely difficult challenge. It is an important responsibility that each of us should be willing to assume for our sake and the sake of our loved ones. It is estimated that only about 20 percent of people in the United States have executed an advance directive. Moreover, it is estimated that less than 50 percent of severely or terminally ill patients have an advance directive. We hope you will help raise public awareness about the need for advance planning. We want as many people as possible to have the information they need to make choices and decisions that will ensure their dignity and care at the end of life. More