Advance Health Care Plan

An Advance Health Care Plan (AHCP) helps you to make plans for your future medical treatment and care needs. It sets out what quality of life would be acceptable to you and what treatments you would or would not agree to for your medical or health care.

In Queensland your AHCP might include:

• an Advance Health Directive
• an enduring power of attorney
• Statement of choices
• a letter to the person who will be responsible for your decision making
• an entry in your medical record
• instructions which clearly voice your view.

Preparing your AHCP encourages you to reflect on what is important to you, your beliefs, values, goals and preferences in life. It explains how you want to be cared for if you reach a point where you cannot communicate decisions about your medical care. It keeps you involved in your medical decisions, both now and in the future, whether you are healthy or have an illness.

Advance care planning becomes important should you become so unwell that you are no longer able to make decisions or communicate about your medical and care needs. By creating a plan in advance, your doctors and family can understand how you would like to be cared for. Your family and friends will find it easier to make informed decisions on your behalf, because you have explained your wishes and what is important to you.

Statement of Choices

Queensland Health has made planning easier by developing a Statement of Choices form. Your Statement of Choices focuses on your values, wishes and beliefs. It is not a legal document and you do not have to use it, you may have a different format, or you may wish to write this information out in your own document. It is a record of your future preferences for care and medical treatment. It can help your substitute decision maker to make health care decisions if you are not able to make decisions for yourself. The information contained in in your statement can be used to guide the way you are cared for.

If you want to utilise the Queensland Health Statement of Choices, chose the correct form from the two options below:

If you are filling out an advance care plan for yourself:

• Download and complete the Statement of Choices Form A (PDF, 453KB).
• Form A can be completed by an adult with the capacity to make decisions about their health care into the future.
• Do NOT complete Form B.

If you are filling out an advance care plan on behalf of someone else:

• Download and complete the Statement of Choices Form B (PDF, 456KB).
• You can only complete Form B on behalf of another adult if you are their substitute decision maker if they do not have the capacity to make decisions about their health or communicate those wishes.
• Do NOT complete Form A