The need for POLST: Minnesota's initiative.

In 2008, the Minnesota Medical Association created a task force to develop a standardized Physician/Provider Orders for Life-SustainingTreatment (POLST) form that could be used throughout Minnesota. Whereas advance directives are created by patients to communicate their wishes about end-of-life care to a physician or other health care provider, POLST forms are used by a physician (or other designated health care provider) to document and communicate a person's end-of-life wishes to other health care professionals, including other physicians. Several states have adopted POLSTforms. This article describes the effort to create a POLST initiative and form in Minnesota.