Canadian Resources to Support Patients Making Decisions about Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID)

Abstract

Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) was legalized in Canada in 2016. In 2021, an update in legislation included changes to MAID eligibility and procedural safeguards. Guided by the Ottawa Decision Support Framework (ODSF), the overall aim was to describe how Canadian patients considering MAID are being supported in making the decision about end-of-life care. Eleven articles were included in the literature review. ODSF themes are evident in MAID literature. Nurses play key roles in end-of-life decision-making. Environmental scan of publicly available MAID resources identified 58 eligible resources. Sixty-nine percent of MAID resources were updated with 2021 legislation. None met the International Patient Decision Aid Standards criteria. Thirty met Patient Education Materials Assessment standard for adequate understandability and 11 for actionability. Although patient decision aids are effective for supporting health care decisions, none exist for MAID and current resources are inadequate for supporting people of lower health literacy.