Advance Health Care Directives: Towards a Coordinated European Policy?

Abstract:

The aim of this paper is to compare the different existing approaches to advance health care directives within the European context, and to explore the possibility of reaching a deeper consensus among countries on this subject. To this end, it first discusses the shortcomings of Article 9 of the Council of Europe's Biomedicine Convention.

Second, it offers a comparative analysis of the legal status of advance directives in a number of European countries.

Finally, it presents the conclusions of an international interdisciplinary workshop focused on this topic that was held in Zurich in June 2008.