Discrepancies in end-of-life decisions between elderly patients and their named surrogates.

Introduction: This study aims to determine the attitudes of Asian elderly patients towards invasive life support measures, the degree of patient-surrogate concordance in end-of-life decision making, the extent to which patients desire autonomy over end-of-life medical decisions, the reasons behind patients' and surrogates' decisions, and the main factors influencing patients' and surrogates' decision-making processes. We hypothesize that there is significant patient-surrogate discordance in end-of-life decision making in our community.

Materials And Methods: The patient and surrogate were presented with a hypothetical scenario in which the patient experienced gradual functional decline in the community before being admitted for life-threatening pneumonia.