Advance directives, substituted judgment, and the best-interest standard all have limitations that constrain their usefulness in making medical decisions for patients who cannot choose for themselves.
New brain imaging suggests that asking patients to put themselves in their surrogates’ shoes when thinking about advance directives might lead to directives that better line up with what surrogates think they should decide.
Advance directives do not always resolve questions about the best care for patients who no longer have decision-making capacity; physicians and patient surrogates can take alternative approaches to arrive at the best care decision.
Medical school admission committees can act within current legal guidelines to identify and recruit students from groups that are underrepresented in medicine.