The Reason to Get a Living Will
By Barry Zimmer on February 24th, 2015 in Medical legal documents
It may be an unpleasant topic, but many people have not taken the time to get Living Wills. These are simple documents that give doctors instructions over what life-sustaining treatments to provide when a person is terminally ill with no chance of recovery.
Even more amazing than an ordinary person not getting a Living Will after the Schiavo situation is that someone in an extremely dangerous profession would not get a Living Will. However, that is exactly what happened with boxer Hector “Macho” Camacho who recently passed away after being shot outside of a Puerto Rico nightclub. When he was pronounced brain dead, doctors had to ask Camacho’s family what to do and what treatments to provide because the boxer did not have a Living Will. As with Schiavo’s family, Camacho’s family did not all agree about what should be done and argued about it.
Do not leave these decisions up to your family. Nothing good can come from it if you do. Talk to an estate planning attorney about getting a Living Will and making these decisions for yourself long before they need to be made.