Sep 17, 2026 · 43 min · 10 segments
Even when you're in the best shape of your life, it's smart to have a care plan in place for when you may not be. On this episode of *Aging Forward*, Jennifer Brull, M.D., of the American Academy of…
Jennifer BrullGuestKristin MeinzerHost
Yeah, I love the phrase advanced care planning because it really explains what it is.
It is about when people, humans, think about what they want in the event that they might become seriously ill or even enter a phase of their life where they are actively dying.
It's about thinking now about what would be important in that moment and being able to convey your wishes to the people who might take care of you and to your family.
Can you walk us through the many different things addressed in an advanced care plan?
Yeah, there are several different pieces that you could find in an advanced care plan.
Probably the most common thing that we see is that people have selected a durable power of attorney.
This is a person that they trust to be able to make decisions on their behalf immediately.
So this person doesn't step in if you are cognitively intact and can convey your wishes.
They do step in at the point where you can no longer do that for yourself and somebody needs to make decisions.
The second thing that we will often see is something that people call a living will.
And a living will is a document that just conveys to physicians, to hospitals, to the emergency medical service, and to your family and friends, what are those things that are really important to you as you near the end of your life or if you become very ill? What would you want people to do? And maybe more importantly, what would you not want people to do at that point in your The third set of documents go by a lot of different names.
Essentially, they are physician orders that are signed by both you, as this is what I want, and your physician, as this is what I'm telling you to do or not do, that convey specifics around things like resuscitation or chest compressions or intubation or feeding tubes and or any of those things that often happen right at the end of someone's life.
And then when you give your advanced care planning documents to your physician or to the hospital system that you work with, they will file it in your electronic health record, in your chart, so that any clinician in that system or that office can access what is important to you.
Yeah, I love the phrase advanced care planning because it really explains what it is.
It is about when people, humans, think about what they want in the event that they might become seriously ill or even enter a phase of their life where they are actively dying.
It's about thinking now about what would be important in that moment and being able to convey your wishes to the people who might take care of you and to your family.
Can you walk us through the many different things addressed in an advanced care plan?
Yeah, there are several different pieces that you could find in an advanced care plan.
Probably the most common thing that we see is that people have selected a durable power of attorney.
This is a person that they trust to be able to make decisions on their behalf immediately.
So this person doesn't step in if you are cognitively intact and can convey your wishes.
They do step in at the point where you can no longer do that for yourself and somebody needs to make decisions.
The second thing that we will often see is something that people call a living will.
And a living will is a document that just conveys to physicians, to hospitals, to the emergency medical service, and to your family and friends, what are those things that are really important to you as you near the end of your life or if you become very ill? What would you want people to do? And maybe more importantly, what would you not want people to do at that point in your The third set of documents go by a lot of different names.
Essentially, they are physician orders that are signed by both you, as this is what I want, and your physician, as this is what I'm telling you to do or not do, that convey specifics around things like resuscitation or chest compressions or intubation or feeding tubes and or any of those things that often happen right at the end of someone's life.
And then when you give your advanced care planning documents to your physician or to the hospital system that you work with, they will file it in your electronic health record, in your chart, so that any clinician in that system or that office can access what is important to you.
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