The Right to Die The Law of End-of-Life Decisionmaking - 2nd 2017 Supplement

For decades, Wolters Kluwer has been publishing an annual supplement for The Right to Die: The Law of End-of-Life Decisionmaking.  This year, we are moving to a semi-annual plan.  So, there will soon be a second 2017 update, the "2017-2 Supplement."

Highlights of this extra supplement cover the most recent legal developments—judicial cases, legislation, and news accounts of important legal proceedings that are not officially reported—concerning end-of-life decisionmaking. Some (and there are many more) specific important matters covered in the supplement include:

• The passage of statutes authorizing medical aid-in-dying in two more states, bringing the total number of jurisdictions in which the practice is legal to seven.
• The passage of statutes explicitly criminalizing or otherwise prohibiting aid-in-dying in two more states.
• The passage of statutes authorizing default surrogate priority lists in two more states.
• An innovative Montana statute authorizing physician decisionmaking for incapacitated unrepresented patients with no surrogate, agent, or guardian.
• The passage of a statute authorizing a POLST program, bringing the total number of jurisdictions formally authorizing or regulating POLST to thirty-three. 
• A Kansas statute forbidding the institution of a DNR order for a minor without consent from the parent or guardian. 
• The passage of statutes in four states both forming palliative care and quality of life task forces and directing health departments to promote both professional and consumer palliative care education.
• A strong statement of support for autonomy through advance directives from the California Court of Appeals as it awarded attorneys’ fees to a governmental agency that challenged the end-of-life decisionmaking of a husband, with his wife as agent, supported by the health providers involved in his care.