BACKGROUND: Medical treatment decisions should be based on the preferences of informed patients or their proxies and on the expected outcomes of treatment. Because seriously ill patients are at risk for cardiac arrest, examination ...

CONTEXT: Previous studies have documented that cancer patients tend to overestimate the probability of long-term survival. If patient preferences about the trade-offs between the risks and benefits associated with alternative ...

BACKGROUND: Physicians are frequently unaware of patient preferences for end-of-life care. Identifying and exploring barriers to patient-physician communication about end-of-life issues may help guide physicians and ...

CONTEXT: The epidemiology of do-not-resuscitate (DNR) orders for hospitalized patients has been reported, but little is known about factors associated with the use of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). OBJECTIVE: To identify ...

PURPOSE: For patients hospitalized with serious illnesses, we identified factors associated with a stated preference to forgo cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR), examined physician-patient communication about these issues, ...

BACKGROUND: Patient age may influence decisions to withhold life-sustaining treatments, independent of patients' preferences for or ability to benefit from such treatments. Controversy exists about the appropriateness of ...

OBJECTIVE: Would increasing the documentation of advance directives (ADs) lead to a reduction in resource utilization? We examined this question by conducting three secondary analyses: (1) we tested for a change in ...