I was very interested in the topic of advanced directives that we read towards the beginning of the semester. In talking with a few of my other classmates in the class, I came to realization that I am of a different opinion than most when it comes to how we view the ethics of advanced directives. Most of those I talked to did not seem to agree with their implementation (except for in severe cases such as vegetative states). I would argue that advanced directives are not only an ethical practice, but also a very useful one. The whole idea behind an advanced directive is that an autonomous person chooses ahead of time what he/she wishes to happen to him/her in the case of an illness, disease, or disaster. Many times these directives include
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When choosing to create an advanced directive, that person is making the autonomous choice to decide the quality of life that they wish to maintain. Should something happen that eliminates that possibility, the advanced directive gives the care-providers a clear cut instruction manual as to how they should proceed. For example, say someone states in their advanced directive that if they were to ever lose their cognitive functioning, they would not wish to receive any further life-saving interventions (Buchanan). Then, should this situation ever arise, the doctors know exactly what to do and what not to do. This eliminates possible distress or argumentation between family members on what they think the patient “would want”. I recognize some of the issues mentioned by Buchanan in his paper on advanced directives, issues concerning personal identity. These issues stem from the idea that should there be something that causes a person to be severely neurologically damaged, but not to the point of death or vegetative states, the ‘new’ person might not want what the ‘first’ person wanted. The new person might seem to be completely content in their goings-on, even though quite impaired, thus making it seem immoral to act in a way that would end (or at least not prolong) their life
When choosing to create an advanced directive, that person is making the autonomous choice to decide the quality of life that they wish to maintain. Should something happen that eliminates that possibility, the advanced directive gives the care-providers a clear cut instruction manual as to how they should proceed. For example, say someone states in their advanced directive that if they were to ever lose their cognitive functioning, they would not wish to receive any further life-saving interventions (Buchanan). Then, should this situation ever arise, the doctors know exactly what to do and what not to do. This eliminates possible distress or argumentation between family members on what they think the patient “would want”. I recognize some of the issues mentioned by Buchanan in his paper on advanced directives, issues concerning personal identity. These issues stem from the idea that should there be something that causes a person to be severely neurologically damaged, but not to the point of death or vegetative states, the ‘new’ person might not want what the ‘first’ person wanted. The new person might seem to be completely content in their goings-on, even though quite impaired, thus making it seem immoral to act in a way that would end (or at least not prolong) their life