New York needs a medical decision-making law!

New York is the only state (besides Missouri) to have failed to create a medical decision making protocol for patients who have not named a proxy decision maker in advance.

The proposed Family Health Care Decisions Act (FHCDA) offers to protect people who don’t document their wishes. It would give family members (including broadly defined domestic partners) the authority to make treatment decisions for incapacitated patients who have not signed a health care proxy or left specific oral or written treatment instructions.

Please take a moment to tell the State Senate to hurry up and vote on the Family Health Care Decisions Act.

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Advocates of marriage equality talk about health care decision making as if it depends on the right to marry, but linking medical decision making to marriage in NY is misleading. Married New Yorkers do not have the right to make medical decisions for their spouses in the absence of written directives, except in ‘do not resuscitate’ situations. Neither parents, siblings nor close friends have this right – it does not exist in NY State. (Of course, all competent NY adults do have the right to designate health care proxies and to choose whether to have extraordinary resuscitation using state-approved documentation. Unfortunately, few New Yorkers do the paperwork.)

For even more richly detailed information about the Family Health Care Decisions Act and its importance to New Yorkers, visit our colleagues at Compassion and Support.

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New York needs a medical decision-making law!