April 16 is National Advance Care Planning Day

Will your community know what care you’d want if you couldn’t speak for yourself?

Whether you know it or not, everyone has a community of care. It’s made up of the people you help, and the people you depend on for help. 

What if you became ill and couldn’t speak for yourself, would your community – your family, close friends, and health-care providers – know your wishes for your health care? Do they know who would speak for you?

April 16 is National Advance Care Planning Day. It’s an invitation to consider your thoughts and ideas about your future health care.

In B.C., the first step for future health-care planning is to learn more about Advance Care Planning. The BC Centre for Palliative Care has teamed up with the BC Hospice Palliative Care Association and 23 local hospice societies to increase public awareness of Advance Care Planning. 

The Alberni Valley hospice Society is hosting another free workshop on May 8th, 2017. We have been hosting these workshops at various locations throughout or community over the last two years and find the conversations are getting started.

We hope to connect with you.

Advance Care Planning is a process that prepares you and your family to make decisions about your health care. It supports you in understanding and sharing your thoughts about: what matters most to you; who makes health-care decisions for you if you cannot; and what health-care treatments you would or would not want. 

Knowing in advance your values, beliefs and wishes as they relate to health care, will help you get the care that’s right for you. 

British Columbians are thinking about their future health-care decisions, but less than half have talked it over with family and friends and fewer still have documented their wishes or shared them with their doctor. A 2016 telephone poll commissioned by BC CPC found:

• 79 per cent have thought about who would make decisions for them if needed;
• 71 per cent have thought about what matters most for their health care;
• 49 per cent have talked with their family about their health-care wishes;
• 21 per cent have documented or recorded their health-care wishes;
• yet only 10 per cent have talked with their doctor about their health-care wishes.

More information about Advance Care Planning can be found on the BC Centre for Palliative Care website (http://www.bc-cpc.ca/cpc/advance-care-planning-2/. Additional resources can be found on Advance Care Planning in Canada’s Speak Up website (http://www.advancecareplanning.ca/) .

You can join the conversation on Twitter using the hashtags #ACPDAY2017 and #mycommunity.

Contact, Alberni Valley Hospice Society  @ 250-723-4478