20 What’s supported decision making got to do with advance care planning?

<h3></h3> In this presentation John Chesterman (the Queensland Public Advocate) and Theresa Flavin (an activist and advocate living with dementia) will explore the relevance of developments in the field of supported decision making to advance care planning. The presentation will briefly provide an analysis of evolving legal requirements concerning supported decision making, which broadly carry with them two key implications for advance care planning: the need to make advance care planning processes accessible even to people with significant cognitive disabilities; and the need to ensure that the person themselves – and not just their plan and/or any appointed decision maker – continues to remain central to any decisions that affect them, even if they have, or acquire, a cognitive disability. The presentation will examine what this means from the perspective of people living with a cognitive disability, such as dementia, and will explore the structural and other impediments that inhibit people in this cohort from fully engaging with advance care planning. The presentation will also discuss how expanding the range of topics normally associated with advance care planning – beyond the legally instrumental – offers significant potential benefits to the people who are, or should be, at the centre of this enterprise.