Patient Self-Determinaton Act Checkpoint

Patient Self-Determination Act CheckPoint

HCR/210

The Patient Self-Determination Act requires consumers to be provided with informed consent, information about their right to make advance health care decisions (called advance directives), and information about state laws that impact legal choices in making health care decisions. This Act required many hospitals, nursing homes, home health agencies, hospice providers, HMOs, and other health care organizations to provide information about advance health care directives to adult patients when they were admitted to a health care facility. Some examples of advance directives would include the Do Not Resuscitate (DNR) Order, Health Care Proxy, Living Will, Durable Power of Attorney for Health Care, and Organ or Tissue Donation. The Patient Self-Determination Act simply means that patients have the right to make their own decisions about the health care and whatever treatment in which they receive and the ability to make those decisions wisely, as long as they remain within the limits of the laws. I believe that by having the Patient Self-Determination Act, it has helped records management procedures in the long run. In the health care field, you want to make sure that you are doing everything correctly and do not miss one piece of information that should have been or should be documented. By allowing patients to have these rights, it allows them to not forget any of these steps and in the end it protects not only the patients but the health care professionals as well. It allows everything to be documented so that if there is a possibility of someone trying to sue the hospital over a misunderstanding, everything is right there and documented so that it covers them and so that there are no misunderstandings. Patients have their own rights as to what it is they want to do when it comes to their health and their lives as long as it stays within the limits of the laws.

References

Green, Michelle (2005)....