How to Let a Loved One Die with DignityDo you know how to comfort a family member who is dying without letting your own emotions get in the way?Or would you do everything possible to keep your loved one alive because you can't bear the thought of losing them?Do you know how to follow a patient's Advanced Care Directive, a legal document that specifies how their family and doctors are to care for them if they become incapacitated?Caregivers are rarely able to let go of the ones they love. “I’m not there yet” or “I don’t know what to do” becomes a cry for help. Dr. Kevin Haselhorst, who has spent 25 years working in hospital emergency rooms, says caregivers need to be prepared, do what is best for the patient and know how to "let go." In Wishes to Die For, you will learn:• How to honor your loved one's final wishes, even if that means no feeding tubes or ventilators.• How to view death as a spiritual journey.• Why writing your own Advanced Care Directive helps you become a better caregiver. In Wishes To Die For, Dr. Kevin Haselhorst brings his deep experience as an ER physician to the task of helping us, and those we love, die with forethought, dignity, and peacefulness. --Larry Dossey, MD, author of One Mind: How Our Individual Mind Is Part of a Greater Consciousness and Why It Matters It is well worth taking this journey with the author to help us clarify our own beliefs. --Carol Bradley Bursack, author and columnist, Minding Our Elders Drawing from his experiences as an emergency room physician, Dr. Kevin Haselhorst has crafted his book Wishes to Die For as a heartfelt and enlightened appeal that 'patients be allowed to die the way their doctors do.' His thoughtful Universal Healthcare Directive should serve as a roadmap for future discussions as we ponder how to honor our patients' dignity and divinity at the end-of-life. --Karen Wyatt, MD, hospice physician and author, What Really Matters Foreword By Carol Bradley Bursack, author and columnist, Minding Our Elders "Code Blue!" A voice cries out in the Emergency Department. "Is there a doctor who can 'tube' a patient in Cardiac Cath Lab?" With these first lines of Wishes To Die For: A Caregiver's Guide to Advance Care Directives ,  Dr. Kevin J. Haselhorst prepares readers for a journey that will help them clarify their personal views about what constitutes life.  What decisions do you want made for you as you approach your final days , hours or minutes, or even earlier if an incapacitating event alters your ability to make your own medical decisions even temporarily? Does your spouse know what you'd want? Do your other family members?  If you have not made you're your wishes clear, in written form, often what the medical team may be required to do could conflict with what you or your family wants done - or not done.Why? Because without written guidance, once you or your loved one are in the care of medical personnel their medical oath and directive will prevail. Dr. Haselhorst knows about this subject from the perspective of a compassionate physician. In "Wishes" he describes his own internal battle to balance his training as a doctor who'cures at all costs' with his patients' desires. Through his book, Haselhorst encourages us, as potential patients, to examine our right to decide how, and under what circumstances, we will be allowed to die a natural death. Haselhorst builds a solid case that a document expressing our end-of-life desires should be fluid, changing with our age, our health and our own fluctuating point of view. The treatment that we would choose when we are 35 years old may be vastly different from the treatment we'd choose at age 80. He writes, "I cannot remember the last time that I wished for a feeding tube, dialysis or ventilator." Haselhorst is not denigrating life-saving treatments. He is simply stressing that we must continually update our health directive so that it reflects our current wishes. Haselhorst challenges us to examine what we would want as our lives evolve. Treatments that increase our chances for survival may be a correct choice under some circumstances. But there often comes a time in our lives where less medical intervention is in our best interest. Unless our current wishes are made known to our health providers and family, we may not be able to choose the manner in which our life comes to a close. While reading the book I underlined,highlighted, and placed colored tabs on pages so that I could remember the most vital information and pass it along. Before long, I realized Haselhorst's words must be read in the context of the book in order to reveal their full meaning. Haselhorst believes strongly that people have a right to change their minds about end-of-life care right up to their last breath. To address this belief, he has designed a wristband similar to the ubiquitous Livestrong Foundation wristband. Haselhort's wrist  band is bright yellow and embossed with the words