Living Will May Not Guarantee Wishes Are Followed Even when close relatives know what an individual's living will expresses, chances are those treatment preferences will not be followed, results of a study suggest. A host of prior studies have demonstrated that family members and physicians fare poorly in following an individual's life-sustaining treatment preferences in the absence of a living will (or ``advance directive''), according to Dr. Peter Ditto from the University of California at Irvine, and associates. What has never been tested, though, is whether preferences expressed in a living will are actually honored. The investigators looked at whether the existence of a living will--with and without thorough discussion of its contents among patients and their relatives--actually improved the accuracy with which an individual's surrogates predicted his or her treatment preferences. In the absence of a living will, relatives correctly predicted patient preferences less than 70% of the time, the authors report. Surprisingly, living wills--even with thorough discussions between patients and relatives--failed to improve the accuracy of the surrogates' predictions, the researchers note. Thanks to Reuters Health. Remember we are NOT Doctors and have NO medical training. This site is like an Encylopedia - there are many pages, many links on many topics. Support our work with any size DONATION - see left side of any page - for how to donate. You can help raise awareness of CAM.