Advance Directives

Talking about end-of-life care and expressing your wishes can be difficult at any stage of life. But these conversations are important, and we at White River Family Practice want all of our patients to feel more comfortable discussing this subject with family.

We want to help get the conversation started and encourage you to think about what you want—and don’t want—when the time comes for these hard decisions. The Institute for Healthcare Improvement has put together a great “conversation starter kit” that we recommend, and we have copies in our office or you can access it via this website: www.theconversationproject.org. Reviewing this yourself, and then with family or close friends, can help make the conversation easier to make decisions when the time comes.

It’s not easy to talk about dying, but it is really important.

To get advance directive forms, if you live in New Hampshire, go to
www.healthynh.org or call (603) 225-0900.

If you live in Vermont, go to www.vtethicsnetwork.org or call (802) 828-2909. In Vermont, you can even get your advance directive registered with your driver’s license.