Advance directives give you a voice in decisions about your medical care when you are unconscious or too ill to communicate. As long as you are able to express your own decisions, your advance directive will not be used and you can accept or refuse any medical treatment. But if you become seriously ill, you may lose the ability to participate in decisions about your own treatment. That’s when your advance directive becomes important. Advance directives should be registered with the living Will registry.

Preparing an advance directive should be done with a lot of thinking. You can consult an attorney but more important is discussing your plans with your loved ones. This is not a very pleasant topic to talk about. In fact, it is something that you will be tempted to keep putting off. But after you have gone through the process you will feel secure in the thought that you have helped made decisions so they will not feel any guilt or remorse.