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SEATTLE, WA---Influenced by the Terri Schiavo case in Florida, the Department of Health of the state of Washington will set up a statewide registry for specified health care declarations that is accessible electronically by individuals, their personal representatives and health care facilities and providers.
Under a bill signed Friday by Gov. Chris Gregoire, a secure website containing a registry of living wills and other health care directives for end-of-life medical care for citizens of the state would be established.
The state health department would establish and maintain the registry of health care declarations which will include advance directives, durable powers of attorney for health care, mental health advance directives and forms establishing physician orders for emergency medical service personnel.
Residents will be able to either send the health care declarations to the department to place in the registry or they may submit them directly to the registry in a digital format. The department will not be responsible for determining that any of the health care declarations have been properly executed.
Individuals must have access to their health care declarations and the ability to revoke them at all times. Personal representatives, health care facilities, attending physicians and health care providers acting under the direction of a physician must have access to the registry at all times.
A health care declaration that is stored in the registry may be revoked by standard methods or according to a method developed by the department. Revocation of a health care declaration stored in the registry by means of a standard method is valid even if the Department is not notified of the revocation.
Under the new measure, the health department would be immune from civil liability for its administration and operation of the registry except in cases of gross negligence, willful misconduct, or intentional wrongdoing.
The stated intent of the bill is that the electronic registry improve access to advance directives and mental health advance directives, but not supplant the current system of using these documents. The intent is also stated to be that health care providers consult the registry in all situations where there may be a question about the patient's wishes for periods of incapacity and the existence of a document of the patient's intentions.
The Health Care Declarations Registry Account is created for the purpose of creating and maintaining the registry and educating the public about the registry. The account is appropriated and is to be funded through donations and appropriations.
The sponsor of the bill, Rep. Jim Moeller, D-Vancouver, said that the Schiavo case inspired him to introduce the legislation.
Terri Schindler-Schiavo collapsed under suspicious and still unexplained circumstances in 1990 and sustained serious brain damage. After receiving a medical malpractice settlement, her husband, Michael Schiavo ordered that all rehabilitative services for Terri be stopped and he petitioned the court for permission to end her life by the removal of her assisted feeding. Terri had signed no living will at age 26 when she collapsed.
From 1990 to 2000, Michael Schiavo gave no indication that Terri had allegedly expressed her wish that she would not want to be kept alive by artificial means, although prior to 1999 in Florida, assisted feeding had not been deemed to be “artificial life support”.
Only after the guardian ad litem appointed to the case recommended that the feeding tube not be removed because there was no indication that it would be Terri’s wish did Schiavo suddenly recall, without substantiating evidence, that she had stated some 15 years previous in the early 80’s at the time she would have been about 22 years of age that she would not want to live by a feeding tube. He produced two members of his family to supposedly support his statements. Although Terri’s family and her close friends disputed Schiavo’s claim, Judge George Greer ruled that Schiavo’s self-serving hearsay evidence, prohibited from admission under Florida’s evidence code, was clear and convincing evidence that Terri would want to die by starvation and dehydration.
Had Terri effected a living will or left advance directives, she might well be alive today and the decade-long battle in the courts between her parents and her estranged husband and guardian would not have occurred.
The new law will take effect in June.
http://www.leg.wa.gov/pub/billinfo/2005-06/Pdf/Bills/House%20Passed%20Legislature/2342-S2.PL.pdf 3-19-06
© 2006 North
Country Gazette
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