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Legal and ethical issues associated with Advance Care Directives in an Australian context
Author(s) -
Denniss D. L.
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
internal medicine journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.596
H-Index - 70
eISSN - 1445-5994
pISSN - 1444-0903
DOI - 10.1111/imj.13288
Subject(s) - legislation , statutory law , medicine , context (archaeology) , ethical issues , order (exchange) , end of life care , law , nursing , engineering ethics , palliative care , political science , business , paleontology , biology , engineering , finance
The need for appropriate mechanisms guiding end‐of‐life care is increasingly vital. This commentary compares the use of Advance Care Directives (ACD) in New South Wales and South Australia in order to highlight the inconsistency in Australian legislation, before exploring common problems, legal concerns and ethical issues associated with their application in an adult population. The benefits and detriments of statutory legislation for ACD are also evaluated.