The reason for preparing an advance health-care directive is to make known your wishes relating to your future health care, including end of life decisions. Of course, if you’re able to express your wishes when decisions have to be made, your instructions will be followed. But if you’re unable to communicate what you want, or what you don’t want, the advance health-care directive lets your family and doctors know what your preferences are.

The advance health-care directive also allows you to designate your spouse or someone else as your health-care agent to make all health-care decisions for you, including decisions providing, withholding, or withdrawing life-sustaining procedures and providing, withholding, or withdrawing artificial nutrition and hydration.

If you’d like to prepare your own advance health-care directive, you can use a form that was developed by the Delaware Bar Association’s Committee on Law and the Elderly and which has been approved by the Delaware Attorney General’s Office. You can download a copy of that form here.