Michigan Peace of Mind Registry

Joanna Lax at Dykema has a great
post about the new Michigan Peace of Mind Registry.  I have excerpted a bit of her excellent post
below.

What is the new database?

On June 18, 2012, Michigan
Governor, Rick Snyder, signed legislation establishing the “Peace of Mind
Registry”—a cutting-edge, statewide electronic database for storing
individuals’ health care advance directives and organ donation documents.
Individuals in Michigan will be among the first in the nation  to be able
to electronically upload or send via snail mail, their signed advance directive
and organ donation documents to an accessible  centralized Registry.
Database registration is free and voluntary. To those who do register, the
Peace of Mind Registry will send a receipt and a wallet-sized card documenting
the registration. If an individual should change his/her mind about either the
advance directive or the organ donation, the Peace of Mind Registry will also
include forms to revoke a previous registration.

What is the significance of the Peace of Mind
Registry for health care providers?

The Peace of Mind Registry will
enable hospitals, nursing homes, physicians and other health care providers to
search for advance directives in a centralized location no matter where the
patient lives in Michigan. It will also allow providers to download advance
directives directly into their own electronic medical record system. Curiously,
health care providers are not mandated by the new legislation to check the
Peace of Mind Registry when a new patient is admitted. However, since the early
1990s health care providers have had an obligation under their Medicare
provider agreements to ask all newly admitted inpatients whether they have an
advance directive, and to take reasonable steps to obtain a copy if one exists.

What best practices can providers adopt now?

Once the Peace of Mind Registry
is operational in Michigan, health care providers should search the database for
all new admits, and to obtain copies of filed advance directives. Note that
providers will still need to confirm that the filed registered directive is the
individual’s most current expression of wishes. It is certainly possible for an
individual to write a second—or third or fourth—advance directive, or to
totally revoke all prior documents, but fail to register these later documents
or actions. Once the Peace of Mind Registry is operational, hospitals, nursing
homes and other health care providers should also update their policies and
procedures regarding advance directives to incorporate the anticipated benefits
of the new data repository.

For those outside Michigan, consider using a private (non-governmental) registry.  The largest one in the United States is DocuBank, based in Philadelphia.