Advance directive

[stronghold]

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In case two of them are available, are they considered in that order: medical power of attorney > living will > oral advance directive?

There also a medical power of attorney sentence in FA I did not understand:
"Patient can revoke anytime patient wishes (regardless of competence). More flexible than a living will."

May you explain it?

 

[thawunandonly]

If those are greater than signs, then I thought it was the other way around.

You think of what most closely represents the actual person and their wishes. This will take priority because it is essentially what the person describes themselves. And also the most recent communication from the patient trumps all else. Since power of attorney is technically "someone else," living will is "a [written] description from time X," and oral advance directive is what they themselves describe, which can be constantly updated and communicated to multiple people to support interpretation, etc...then the latter should be prioritized.

I think. >________>

 

[stronghold]

Sorry, I did not understand you. You mean that the oral directive is the most powerful?!

 

[thawunandonly]

Well that's what I thought if I remember from a Kaplan video. Please correct me though.

 

[stronghold]

I remember one Rx explanation mentioned that medical power of attorney >>>>> living will. So this contradict with your theory. However, I am not sure if Rx is right because it has many mistakes!

Any input guys?

 

[Hemichordate]

Here's another question I'm wondering about

Say a person gets a scan and the results show that he/she has some kind of cancer. What does the physician say to the patient?

Does he tell her that she has cancer? Does he say that there are some abnormal masses? Or does he say that we need to run more test?

The one choice you never pick on step 1 is refer to another physician, right?

 

[Hemichordate]

Anyone?

 

[stronghold]

Here's another question I'm wondering about

Say a person gets a scan and the results show that he/she has some kind of cancer. What does the physician say to the patient?

Does he tell her that she has cancer? Does he say that there are some abnormal masses? Or does he say that we need to run more test?

The one choice you never pick on step 1 is refer to another physician, right?

Unless there is nothing in the stem that informing the patient would harm, or he previously said not to inform her the result, then I will choose "tell her that she has cancer". Also, I would pick a choice like "results correlate with cancer but we need to run more tests to confirm"

 

[Transposony]

You never tell patient that they have cancer unless it is confirmed on histology.
All you say at this stage they have a tumor and you need to run some test to find out what exactly they might have.

 

[thawunandonly]

Can anyone clarify the whole advance directive thing?

 

[stronghold]

You never tell patient that they have cancer unless it is confirmed on histology.
All you say at this stage they have a tumor and you need to run some test to find out what exactly they might have.

But the choices he listed don't contain such one. You have to choose between "tell the patient that she has cancer" or "we need to run more tests"

 

[Donald Juan]

But the choices he listed don't contain such one. You have to choose between "tell the patient that she has cancer" or "we need to run more tests"

Yes, there was another choice: tell them its an abnormal mass. Like the previous poster said, you don't just throw out the C word unless you've confirmed the diagnosis (and I don't believe a mass on a scan is diagnostic for cancer). Also, just telling the patient "we need to run more tests" is keeping them out of the loop on their care.