The Conversation Project

The Conversation Project has some great tools to help anyone -- including clients -- start the difficult talk with loved ones about end-of-life care wishes. The free Starter Kit gently coaches people on how to have this conversation.  And its short worksheets help people think in simple, non-medical terms about their goals at the end of life and for living with advanced illness.

You might consider referring clients to this site when you counsel them to talk with their families about the healthcare wishes they've just documented in their advance directives. It might help them "get over the hump." You could also use the Starter Kit's valuable tool as a homework exercise for your clients prior to completing their legal advance directive in your office.  (Or, you might consider incorporating some of its questions into your client discussion.)  You could also attach the worksheets to clients' advance directives as further expression of the client's wishes and guidance to the healthcare agent.  

Spearheaded by former syndicated columnist Ellen Goodman, The Conversation Project began with leaders in the media, clergy, and medicine sharing their own storiesof "good death" and "bad deaths" of those they loved.

January 31, 2013 | Advance Care Planning News, Estate Planning / Elder Law Marketing