ADVANCE DIRECTIVES IN SOUTH AFRICA
Planning for future healthcare decisions is an essential part of protecting your well-being and ensuring your wishes are respected in your time of need. One of the most important steps in this process is having open and meaningful conversations with your family members and, if applicable, the person you choose as your healthcare proxy. By clearly expressing your values and preferences, you provide guidance that can help them make informed decisions on your behalf during difficult times.
It is equally important to keep your healthcare documents up to date. As your life circumstances, health status, or personal beliefs evolve, your directives should reflect those changes. Regularly reviewing and revising these documents helps ensure they remain accurate and aligned with your current wishes.
There are two kinds of documents one can utilise when planning for future healthcare; Living Will and Advance Directive.
Advance directive vs Living Will
Advance directive
In an advance directive an individual lays out their preferred medical treatments in the even of a medical crisis. With an advance directive, an individual appoints a healthcare proxy, in other words, an individual appoints another trusted individual to act on their behalf in deciding the kind of care and treatment to be administered. This broad approach offers flexibility wherein proxy can decide on a broader scope of medical issues otherwise not specifically outlined and or where the patients’ exact wishes have not been explicitly documents.
An advanced directive does not only apply to end -of life care but can rather be used in any situation where the individual concerned does not, due to whatever circumstance, have capacity to make decisions. An advance directive takes care of medical eventualities and elects two representatives to make the necessary healthcare decisions for the individual who filed for the directive. A notable virtue of an advance directive lies in its capacity to preserve an individual’s autonomy in circumstances where they are no longer possessed of decision-making capacity, thereby ensuring that their prior expressed wishes continue to govern personal and medical determinations.
Living Will
In contrast, a living will focuses on specific medical treatments and details end of life care preferences and interventions. A living will is typically applied in end-of life scenarios. A living will does not involve the appointment of a proxy as the individual who draws the living will specifically outlines their preferred treatments and end-of-life care.
Whether you opt for a living will or an advance directive, protecting you needs and ensuring your loved ones are guided in the face of the inevitable is vital.
Taking care of the eventualities of life gives you peace of mind and protects loved one from having to make those ever so difficult decisions when life happens and the eventuality turns to reality. Ensuring your loved ones and healthcare providers know your true wishes and can easily obtain copies of same in times of need can prevent confusion and delays, honour your dignity in your most vulnerable moments.
How and where to file your advance directive?
While generations and generations have trust trusted the mattress to keep the most sensitive of documents safe, we highly recommend filing all your essential documents with one of our specialists who have adequate knowledge of will and estates backed with sufficient experience in courtroom procedures who can legally advise you.
Schedule a consultation with one of our experienced attorneys at Otto Krause Attorneys and gain the assurance that your legal interests will be diligently safeguarded. Our team is committed to providing expert guidance and robust representation to protect and defend your rights at all times.