We know that talking about health care decisions can be hard for some people. Having a conversation\u00a0early, in a non-urgent setting about advance care planning may help the decision-making process\u00a0be less difficult, and it can ensure that your or your loved one\u2019s wishes will be met.<\/p>\n
What is Advance Care Planning?<\/strong> What are Advance Directives?<\/strong> Completing Advance Directives<\/strong> If you or a loved one has advanced illness or frailty, is receiving specialized medical care for a serious\u00a0condition, or is 80+ years old, it becomes even more important to have an advance care plan in place.<\/p>\n Download an Honoring Choices\u00ae advance care planning toolkit and forms on our website at\u00a0healthnewengland.org\/medicare\/forms<\/strong><\/a>. For additional information, visit theconversationproject.org<\/strong><\/a>, and start the conversation with your loved ones today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" We know that talking about health care decisions can be hard for some people. Having a conversation\u00a0early, in a non-urgent setting about advance care planning may help the decision-making process\u00a0be less difficult, and it can ensure that your or your loved one\u2019s wishes will be met. What is Advance Care Planning? Advance care planning helps […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7251,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[17],"tags":[800,549],"class_list":["post-11098","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-medicare","tag-advance-care-planning","tag-advance-directives"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hnetalk.com\/member\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/GettyImages-660475514-e1544737478498.jpg?fit=800%2C534&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6ZZGa-2T0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hnetalk.com\/member\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11098","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hnetalk.com\/member\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hnetalk.com\/member\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hnetalk.com\/member\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hnetalk.com\/member\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11098"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/hnetalk.com\/member\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11098\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12562,"href":"https:\/\/hnetalk.com\/member\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11098\/revisions\/12562"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hnetalk.com\/member\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7251"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hnetalk.com\/member\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11098"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hnetalk.com\/member\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11098"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hnetalk.com\/member\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11098"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nAdvance care planning helps you make decisions about what care you\u00a0would or would not want if you become unable to speak for yourself.\u00a0Advance care planning can be done for yourself, your partner, or a parent.<\/p>\n
\nAdvance directives are legal documents that outline your decisions for\u00a0end-of-life care and medical treatment. Advance directives are prepared\u00a0ahead of time to ensure that your wishes are carried out if you were ever\u00a0unable to communicate with your health care providers.<\/p>\n
\nAdvance directives can be documented by your primary care provider (PCP) or attorney, or you can\u00a0print forms and complete them with your family or caregivers. Be sure to give a copy to your PCP and\u00a0to your designated health care proxy, and keep a copy for yourself in a place easy for others to find.<\/p>\n