Death is inevitable.
However, circumstances like a terminal illness sometimes present a person with a choice of how he or she wishes to die. Making your wishes known prior to the occurrence of a serious illness or injury instructs your doctor and your family of the care you wish to receive. A living will is a document which permits you to specify, in advance, the types of life-prolonging treatments you wish to accept or reject if you become terminally ill. Most people who sign living wills do so to leave orders that if they are hopelessly ill or injured, that no extraordinary measures be used to keep them alive, other than to provide for their comfort and for the prevention or reduction of pain. However, your living will may instruct health care professionals to use extraordinary measures to keep you alive, not just to withhold them.