Centre for Policy on Ageing



How close is enough? — family relationships and attitudes toward advance directives and life-sustaining treatments
Author(s)	Diane E Hoffman, Sheryl Itkin Zimmerman, Catherine Tompkins
Journal title	Journal of Ethics, Law and Aging, vol 3, no 1, Spring/Summer 1997
Pages	pp 5-24
Keywords	Family relationships ; Attitude ; Medical care ; Wills ; Rights [elderly] ; Social surveys ; United States of America.
Annotation	Findings are reported from interviews with 100 over 65s from Baltimore regarding their knowledge of and attitudes toward advance directives (living wills and enduring powers of attorney) and life sustaining treatment. The association between familial relationships, individual characteristics, and such knowledge and attitudes are also reported. Knowledge of advance directives was significantly related to education, race, number of children, and whether a close relative had been in hospital with a life-threatening condition. Completion of an advance directive was significantly related to whether they had made a will, ethnicity, educational level, professional status and "physical proximity" of children. Other factors included whether the respondent or close family member had been on life support, the respondent's age, sex, and extent of social contact with children or significant others. (RH).
Accession Number	CPA-980120214 A
Classmark	DS:SJ: DP: LK: VTH: IKR: 3F: 7T
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...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing.