Who decides whether the patient is mentally incapacitated?

doi:10.1136/bmj.317.7153.280

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Wai-Ching Leung, Senior registrar in public health medicine

Department of Public Health, Sunderland Health Authority, Sunderland SR3 4AF

EDITOR —Gadd highlighted that patients have the right under common law to make advanced refusals, while they have the capacity to do so, of treatments when incapacitated.1 However, the case laws on which this right is based also illustrate the complexities in judging the patient's mental capacity.

In Re T the Court of Appeal held that an advanced written refusal of blood transfusion by a mentally …