If you are no longer able to make your own decisions about your medical care, you do not lose your right to accept or refuse treatment. To ensure your wishes are respected, you can complete an “Advance Health Care Directive.” This document gives instructions, in advance, about your wishes regarding your health care.
You are not required to complete an advance directive. If you become unable to make your own decisions and do not have an advance directive, your family or others close to you may be asked to make decisions for you based on what they believe you would want. If you are under age 18, your parent or guardian will usually make decisions about your medical care
Advance directives can be completed through your attorney’s office, or you can download the necessary forms at http://www.secretary.state.nc.us/ahcdr/.
As a FirstHealth patient, you have the right to:
- Reasonable access to care
- Care that is considerate and respectful
- Care that considers your personal values and beliefs
- Be informed about and help make decisions about your care and help develop and implement your treatment care plan, discharge plan and pain-management plan
- Be involved in ethical questions that may come up during your care, to include:
- Settling conflict
- Withholding resuscitation
- Refusing or stopping of life-sustaining treatment
- Involvement in research studies or clinical trials
- Safety and privacy
- Be informed of available resources for resolving disputes, grievances and conflicts such as the ethics committee, patient advocate and the grievance process
- Confidentiality of information. (See the FirstHealth of the Carolinas Notice of Privacy Practices (NPP) for details.)
- “Opt Out” and be excluded from patient care directories, receiving calls, deliveries, etc.
- Have a Living Will (Declaration of a Desire for a Natural Death)
- Appoint a decision-maker when:
- Unable to understand a proposed treatment or procedure
- Unable to make known your wishes about care
- Information on hospital policies and practices that relate to patient care, treatment and responsibilities
- Arrange for review of records about your care as outlined in hospital policy, unless restricted by law
- Have access to protective services
- Reasonable continuity of care
- Be informed of the hospital’s charges for services and available payment methods
- An appropriate assessment and management of your pain
- Expect emergency procedures to be implemented without unnecessary delay
- Good quality care and high professional standards that are continuously maintained and reviewed
- Be informed and give consent prior to the start of any treatment or procedure or both, unless it is an emergency situation. Consent then can be withdrawn at any time that you do not wish to participate in the procedure or treatment.
- Assistance in obtaining consultation with another physician at your request and expense
- Medical and nursing services without discrimination based on race, color, creed, religion, sex, sexual orientation, national origin or source of payment
- Not to be awakened by hospital staff unless it is medically necessary
- Be free of needless duplication of medical and nursing procedures
- Be transferred to another facility, when medically permissible, after receiving complete information and an explanation concerning the needs for and alternatives to the transfer
- Be informed of your rights at the earliest possible time in the course of your hospitalization
- Be informed about your health status, diagnosis and prognosis
- Appeal a premature discharge
- Receive information about pain and measures to relieve pain
- Have caregivers who are concerned about your pain and who are responsive to reports of pain
- Receive state-of-the-art pain management
- Be able to voice any questions or concerns about pain management
- Be free from physical or mental abuse and corporal punishment and to be free from restraint or seclusion, of any form, imposed by staff as a means of coercion, discipline, convenience, or retaliation
- Seek a review by the Quality Improvement Organization (QIO) related to quality care issues or coverage issues, or seek appeal for a premature discharge issue (This applies to Medicare beneficiaries only.)
Quality Improvement Organization (QIO)
The Carolinas Center for Medical Excellence
100 Regency Forest Drive, Suite 200
Cary, NC 27511-8598
Toll-free (800) 682-2650
As a patient of FirstHealth, you are responsible for:
- Giving details about past illnesses, hospitalizations, medicines and other matters related to your health
- Asking questions when you do not understand information or instructions
- Telling doctors and other caregivers if you believe they cannot follow through with their treatment
- Being aware of the hospital’s obligation to be reasonably efficient and impartial in providing care to other patients and the community
- Making reasonable accommodations to the needs of the hospital, other patients, medical staff and employees
- Giving information for insurance and, when needed, for working with the hospital to arrange payment
- Providing a current copy of your Advance Directive
- Recognizing how your lifestyle affects your personal health
- Communicating the presence of pain to caregivers
- Asking for pain relief when the pain first begins and whenever the pain is not tolerable
- Discussing pain relief options with your caregivers
- Participating in developing a pain management plan with patient caregivers
*A spouse, family member, domestic partner (including same-sex domestic partner), friend, or other individual who supports the patient during his or her hospital stay and may exercise the patient’s visitation rights on his or her behalf. There is no limit on who may be designated a support person by the patient--there is no restriction based on race, color, national origin, religion, sex, gender identify, sexual orientation, or disability.
Children and teens have the right to:
- Respect and personal dignity
- Care that supports them and their families
- Information they can understand
- Quality health care
- Emotional support for themselves and their parents
- Care that respects the need to grow, play and learn
- Make choices and decisions
- Respect and personal dignity for parents
- Care that supports the entire family
- Information that parents can understand
- Care that respects each patient’s growth and development
- Parents/guardians making decisions about the child’s care
- Be informed of available resources for resolving disputes, grievances and conflicts such as ethics committee, patient advocate and the grievance process
- An appropriate assessment and management of their pain
Parents/Guardians are responsible for:
- Providing, to the best of their knowledge, accurate and complete information
- Working with the health care team to provide appropriate care
- Meeting the patient’s financial obligations
- Respecting and considering the rights of others in the hospital
We care about the way our patients feel and want them to be as comfortable as possible during their time in our care. Pain is a normal response of the body to injury or illness, but thanks to modern medicine, we can often control a patient’s pain. While we may not be able to eliminate all pain, we can try to lower it to a tolerable level. This is pain management. Patients have the following rights and responsibilities when it comes to pain management.
- To receive information about pain and measures to relieve pain
- To have caregivers who are concerned about your pain and are responsive to your reports of pain
- To receive state-of-the art pain management
- To be able to voice any questions or concerns you have about pain management
We expect you, as a patient of FirstHealth of the Carolinas, to:
- Communicate about your pain to your caregivers
- Ask for pain relief when your pain first begins and whenever you have pain that you feel you cannot tolerate
- Discuss pain relief options with your caregivers
- Participate in developing a pain-management plan with your caregivers
Click here for FirstHealth’s Notice of Privacy Practice, which explains our privacy policies regarding your personal health information and details your health-information rights under HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996).
