Compassion \u0026 Choices

Compassion \u0026 Choices is leading the way in transforming our \u201Cone-size-fits-all\u201D healthcare system, which allows too much needless pain and suffering, into one that puts people in charge of their own end-of-life care. We envision a patient-driven system that honors an individual\u2019s values, religious views and spiritual beliefs. We are working toward an America that respects everyone\u2019s right to make their own end-of-life care decisions, in consultation with doctors and loved ones. We advocate for expanded options to ensure everyone can die peacefully and with dignity.\n\nCompassion \u0026 Choices works across the nation in communities, state legislatures, Congress, courts and medical settings to: \n- Educate the public about the importance of documenting end-of-life values and priorities and about the full range of available options.\n- Empower every individual with achievable options, authoritative information and constructive advice for guiding their care and engaging with their providers.\n- Advocate for expanded choices, secure and ready access to them and improved medical practice that puts patients first and values quality of life in treatment plans for terminal illness.\n- Defend existing end-of-life options from efforts to restrict access.\n\nOur roadmap to success centers on three long-term objectives within our Strategic Plan to achieve our mission to advance end-of-life choice and care:\n- We have set the bold intention that by 2028, half the U.S. population will live in a location where medical aid in dying is an open and accessible medical practice.\n- We seek to ensure that more patients can access the care they want \u2014 nothing more and nothing less. Our programming includes two key focus areas: 1) closing the disparities in end-of-life care and planning for communities of color and authorizing legislation to advance equity in end-of-life care; and 2) transforming how people with dementia die.\n- We continue to grow a diverse, equitable and inclusive movement in the areas of race, religion, party affiliation, sexual orientation, gender identity and age, so that people of all demographic groups approach life\u2019s end equipped with information and encouraged to claim their voice.

Compassion \u0026 Choices employs a multi-pronged approach, with interconnected strategies that maximize our staff resources, maintain consistent messaging, and leverage voices within communities. Our work centers on: \n\n- Advancing federal and state policy agendas. Compassion \u0026 Choices\u2019 policy agenda works to modernize and advance equitable, high quality end of life care that is patient-directed and -centered. We are advocating for essential end-of-life care options, including medical aid in dying, for seriously and terminally ill individuals while deepening relationships with legislators and stakeholders by providing strategic recommendations to increase patient-directed care across the country.\n- Grassroots advocacy. Compassion \u0026 Choices is leveraging innovative and digital technology to grow our supporter base and amplify the voices of supporters in every corner of the state. We are recruiting, training and mobilizing volunteers who call, email and meet with lawmakers to educate them about end-of-life care options, including medical aid in dying, and demonstrate local support. \n- Building Connections. Compassion \u0026 Choices staff and supporters attend hundreds of events every year to advocate and educate the public about our end-of-life resources and tools. We use these as an opportunity to listen to and learn from communities; educate people; engage with influential voices; and disseminate important end-of-life resources. Our efforts have gained support from several leading national organizations through endorsements and resolutions. \n- Building Collaborations and Partnerships. Compassion \u0026 Choices leadership councils represent diverse groups of executives, community leaders, faith leaders and experts in the fields of medicine, estate planning and more. They meet regularly and work tirelessly to advance the mission of expanding options and improving care at the end of life in their communities. Our efforts have gained support from several leading national organizations through endorsements and resolutions.

As the nation\u2019s oldest, largest and most active nonprofit organization committed to improving care, expanding options and empowering everyone to chart their end-of-life journey, Compassion \u0026 Choices draws on nearly 25 years of experience and the expertise of staff with a wide variety of legal, healthcare and communications backgrounds. We have over 80 staff in our Washington, DC, and Portland, Oregon, offices and across the country with extensive public health, policy, legal and legislative experience. Through their advocacy, education, and outreach, our staff are national leaders in creatively and effectively promoting improved end-of-life planning and care for seriously ill and dying patients.\n\nCompassion \u0026 Choices is the leading nonprofit organization working to improve care and expand choice at the end of life. Since 1980, we have worked to change attitudes, practices and policies so that everyone can access the information and options they need to have more control and comfort at the end of life. Our accomplishments include legitimizing palliative sedation as a medical practice; establishing that undertreatment of pain is a form of elder abuse; and playing a leadership role to secure, protect and implement medical aid in dying across most of the authorized jurisdictions. \n\nWhat sets us apart is the depth and breadth of our tools and programs and the smart, innovative strategies we deploy to bring autonomy and control to the individual. We are experts in finding the appropriate balance between advancing a broad issue agenda to secure and protect end-of-life rights, and carefully identifying the activities that will have the biggest, quickest impact given the urgent needs of dying patients and current political realities. We seek to focus on the \u201Cgame changers\u201D that will create systemic transformation. \n\nIn recent years, our most robust and successful program has been advancing, protecting and implementing medical aid in dying. Over the past seven years, we have more than doubled the number of states authorizing the medical practice and quadrupled the number of people with access to this cherished option. In this period: \n- Seven jurisdictions authorized medical aid in dying: California, Colorado, Hawai\u2019i, Maine, New Jersey, New Mexico and Washington, D.C.;\n- 21 medical societies dropped their opposition; and\n- A dozen national Latino and African American leaders and organizations endorsed end-of-life autonomy.\nCompassion \u0026 Choices has earned its seat at the table with top policymakers and healthcare providers. We forge alliances and partnerships with influential medical organizations that lend us credibility and expertise, including the Leadership Council of Aging Organizations; the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine; and the American Public Health Association.

For more than 40 years, by using a comprehensive strategy including legislative advocacy, grassroots organizing, media outreach \u0026 litigation, Compassion \u0026 Choices, our affiliates, and our predecessor organizations have led most of the significant advances in the movement to expand and improve end-of-life-options \u0026 care. Below is a sampling of our notable achievements.\n\nAdvance Care Planning and End-of-Life Support\nDeveloped the first national end-of-life consultancy program in 1993, which offers patients \u0026 their families tools, information \u0026 emotional support on the full range of available end-of-life options. \nLaunched Finish Strong Tools to empower patients with life-threatening diseases, including dementia, to get the care that reflects their goals, priorities and values.\nPioneered the use of \u0026 transformed advance directives from strictly legal documents to a values-based approach for communicating end-of-life priorities. \nAdvocated for the successful adoption of a new Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services rule allowing the agency to reimburse doctors for advance healthcare planning discussions.\n\nPalliative Care and Pain Management\nLegitimized palliative sedation as a recognized medical practice.\nEstablished the undertreatment of pain as a form of elder abuse \u0026 that caregivers must manage patients\u2019 pain.\nEnacted requirements that healthcare providers share information on end-of-life options. \n\nMedical Aid in Dying\nCompassion \u0026 Choices President Emerita/Senior Adviser Barbara Coombs Lee co-authored Oregon\u2019s landmark Death With Dignity Act, which went into effect in 1997. \nPioneered the medical model of aid in dying that helps ensure that doctors can ethically practice aid in dying in an open, legitimate \u0026 accessible way, \u0026 integrates the option into patients\u2019 end-of-life care. \nAdvanced Glucksberg v. Washington (1997) to the U.S. Supreme Court. The landmark ruling encouraged individual states to engage in an \u201Cearnest and profound debate about the morality, legality and practicality of medical aid in dying, setting the stage for the consideration of legislation at the state level.\u201D\nCompassion \u0026 Choices is dedicated to the authorization, implementation \u0026 protection of expanded end-of-life options. Medical aid in dying is authorized in 11 jurisdictions.\n\nOur roadmap to success centers on three long-term objectives within our Strategic Plan to achieve our mission to advance end-of-life choice \u0026 care:\nWe have set the bold intention that by 2028, half the U.S. population will live in a location where medical aid in dying is an open \u0026 accessible medical practice.\nWe seek to ensure that more patients can access the care they want \u2014 nothing more \u0026 nothing less. \nWe continue to grow a diverse, equitable and inclusive movement in the areas of race, religion, party affiliation, sexual orientation, gender identity and age, so that people of all demographic groups approach life\u2019s end equipped with information and encouraged to claim their voice.