Resolutions Committee Report

Expand All | Contract All

Proposed platform plank changes for:

STRENGTHENING FAMILIES, PROTECTING LIFE, AND PROMOTING HEALTH
CELEBRATING TRADITIONAL MARRIAGE
Patient Protection

Current State Platform plank

We support patients’ rights, especially near the end of life, and call for reform of existing legislation so that:
  1. Texas law should provide that medical personnel may not deny care, change advanced directives, or originate directives for any patient without the permission of the patient or the patient’s designate.
  2. No “Do Not Resuscitate” order may be ordered for a patient without his/her own or family’s knowledge and consent;
  3. We also support the passage of legislation to amend the Advance Directive Act by requiring hospitals intending or threatening to withdraw life-sustaining treatment against the patient’s wishes or their advance directive to continue all treatment and care for such patients pending transfer to another facility.

Committee revised plank

We believe all innocent human life must be respected and safeguarded from fertilization to natural death; therefore, the unborn, the aged, and the physically or mentally challenged have a fundamental individual right to life, which cannot be infringed.
  1. Texas law should provide that medical personnel may not deny care, change advanced directives, or originate directives for any patient without the permission of the patient or the patient's designate.
  2. No "Do Not Resuscitate" order may be ordered for a patient without his/her own or family's knowledge and consent;
  3. We also support the passage of legislation to amend the Advance Directive Act by requiring hospitals intending or threatening to withdraw life-sustaining treatment against the patient's wishes or their advance directive to continue all treatment and care for such patients pending transfer to another facility.
  4. We call on the Texas Legislature to repeal the unethical, unconstitutional, and unprecedented Section 166.046 of the Texas Health and Safety Code and replace it with a truly Pro-Life option that requires physicians to respect a patient or surrogate’s medical decision about basic Life-sustaining treatment while allowing physicians to transfer these patient to another physician or facility that will honor their choice to continue the vulnerable patients basic Life-sustaining treatment while allowing physicians to transfer these patient to another physician physician or facility that will honor their choice to continue the vulnerable patient’s basic Life-sustaining treatment.