Revised Western Australian Advance Health Directive Consultation Survey

In 2020, the WA Health End-of-Life Care Program sought feedback on the revision of the WA Advance Health Directive (AHD) template. The consultation consisted of 2 phases:

• an initial broad consultation phase in August 2020 to seek feedback on proposed content to help shape a draft template
  • included a survey and a series of open invitation face-to-face workshops, regional videoconference consultations, and targeted workshops with key clinicians as well as priority populations including people with mental illness, Aboriginal people, people with disability and people from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds.   
• a road-testing phase in October/November 2020 to gather comments on the usability of the draft template
  • included a survey and 3 face-to-face workshops.

All members of the WA community were encouraged to have their say, with the invitation to participate circulated amongst a broad range of stakeholders including consumers and carers, community organisations, Government departments/areas, health and allied health professionals, health and legal services, and aged care providers.

In total, 295 survey responses were received, and 217 people participated in workshops. Extensive feedback was received including useful suggestions on how to ensure the revised AHD better meets the needs of the community and health professionals: Key themes included:

• support for the inclusion of a value statement and including the value statement at the beginning of the AHD to allow the individual to consider what is important to them before making their treatment decisions
• finding a balance between keeping the form as short as possible whilst also including enough guidance and detail within the questions so people are clear on how to complete it
• need for examples and a clear guidance document to support individuals to complete the AHD
• importance of being able to express the circumstances in which certain treatment decisions apply
• the wording of the form should be simple, clear and in plain English
• overall the majority of respondents felt the proposed changes are an improvement on the current form which can be considered as too vague and open-ended.

The feedback was utilised to develop a final draft AHD template that was reviewed and refined by a working group comprised of WA Health stakeholders, key clinicians, consumers, and Office of the Public Advocate and Department of Justice representatives.

It is anticipated that WA Health will submit the finalised draft AHD template to the Department of Justice in April 2021. Once the Department of Justice have approved the final draft, they will proceed with drafting amendments to the Guardianship and Administration Act Regulations 2005 to incorporate changes to the prescribed AHD form. The revised AHD will be launched and promoted to the community once available.