Advance Medical Directive

Important Note:
Effective July 1, 2009, there are changes in Virginia Law that provide additional options under an Advance Medical Directive. Please see the end of this section for additional information.

An Advance Medical Directive allows you to state what you want for your own medical care if you are unable to make decisions for yourself. You can:

• Direct that a specific procedure or treatment be provided, such as
  artificially administered hydration (fluids) or nutrition (feeding);


• Direct that a specific procedure or treatment be withheld; or


• Appoint a person to act as your agent in making health care
  decisions for you, if it is determined that you are unable to make
  health care decisions for yourself. This includes the decision
  to make anatomical gifts of a specific part or parts of your body via
  organ and tissue donation, or of all of your body.

If you appoint a person to be your agent in an Advance Medical Directive, that person has decision-making priority over any other individuals who, could, by law, make health care decisions for you. For more information, visit the Code of Virginia portion of the Virginia General Assembly Home Page, and type in "54.1-2984" in the "Enter search phrase and click submit" box. You will get a page of search results, and clicking on "§ 54.1-2984" will display the text in that Code Section.

The Code of Virginia also contains the "suggested" text that can be used for an Advance Medical Directive form (.pdf) in Virginia. Advance Medical Directive forms can be completed without the assistance of a lawyer, but you may want to consult one to ensure that you have completed it correctly.

New Law Effective July 1, 2009

Advance Medical Directives and Health Care Decisions Act Revisions; Senate Bill 1142 Acts of Assembly Chapter 268.

Senate Bill 1142 was signed into law March 27, 2009 (to be effective July 1, 2009) and makes significant changes to the Health Care Decisions Act and options available under Advance Medical Directives.

VDA is still in the process of developing and obtaining materials reflecting these new changes in Virginia’s law. However, we are providing this advance alert because some people may be concerned that their current Advance Medical Directive is no longer valid as of 7/1/09 and this is absolutely not true. While new provisions in the law allow additional options, they do not invalidate current Advance Medical Directives. It is also important that persons wanting to “upgrade” to the new form retain their current form until they have properly executed the new Advance Medical Directive form.

More information will follow on this important topic.

You may also find the information on our Personal Planning web page helpful. If you need more information or assistance, contact us.

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