End of Life Issues

Summary

Planning for the end of life can be difficult. But by deciding what end-of-life care best suits your needs when you are healthy, you can help those close to you make the right choices when the time comes.

End-of-life planning usually includes making choices about the following:

• The goals of care (for example, whether to use certain medicines during the last days of life)
• Where you want to spend your final days
• Which treatments for end-of-life care you wish to receive
• What type of palliative care and hospice care you wish to receive

Advance directives can help make your wishes clear to your family and health care providers.

National Institute of Nursing Research

Specifics

• Advanced Illness: Feeding Tubes and Ventilators Family Caregiver Alliance
• Artificial Hydration and Nutrition American Academy of Family Physicians
• Coping with Advanced Cancer: Choices for Care Near the End of Life National Cancer Institute
• End of Life Care AGS Health in Aging Foundation
• End-of-Life Care for People with Dementia National Institute on Aging
• Making Decisions for Someone at the End of Life National Institute on Aging
• Young People Facing End-of-Life Care Decisions National Cancer Institute

Start Here

• Advanced Illness: Holding on and Letting Go Family Caregiver Alliance
• End of Life National Institute on Aging
• End-of-Life Care for People Who Have Cancer National Cancer Institute
• Last Days of Life National Cancer Institute
• Nearing the End of Life American Cancer Society
• Providing Care and Comfort at the End of Life National Institute on Aging

Clinical Trials

• ClinicalTrials.gov: Terminal Care National Institutes of Health

Patient Handouts

• Deciding about treatments that prolong life Medical Encyclopedia
• Do-not-resuscitate order Medical Encyclopedia
• Palliative care – what the final days are like Medical Encyclopedia

Related Issues

• Living Well with a Serious Illness American College of Physicians
• Planning Your Own Funeral Federal Trade Commission
• Shopping for Funeral Services Federal Trade Commission
• Types of Funerals Federal Trade Commission
• What to Do after Someone Dies National Institute on Aging

Find an Expert

• National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization
• National Institute of Nursing Research National Institute of Nursing Research

Journal Articles

• End of life care

Encyclopedia

• Talking with a child about a parent’s terminal illness Medical Encyclopedia
• When your cancer treatment stops working Medical Encyclopedia
• When your child’s cancer treatment stops working Medical Encyclopedia