Cultural beliefs also help to shape these end-of-life attitudes and appear to influence whether individuals agree to an advanced directive that precludes supportive ventilation. It has been observed that African Americans and/or low-income individuals www.selleckchem.com/products/AP24534.html are less likely than non-Hispanic Whites and/or more affluent individuals to prefer extensive life support to include ventilator use [4, 5]. In contrast, Caralis et al. found that in a group of younger Hispanics in the Miami area, they more frequently favored cardiopulmonary resuscitation and ventilator use than either African Americans or Non-Hispanic Whites [5]. Therefore, whether or not ventilator use, especially in the context of a hypothetical terminal condition, is a choice preferred by older Mexican Americans remains an open question.

The purpose of this study was to examine older Mexican Americans attitudes toward mechanical ventilation as a life support option in the context of a hypothetical end-of-life terminal illness within a sample of community-dwelling individuals over age 60.2. Designs and Methods2.1. Setting and SampleSubjects were recruited between December 2007 and May 2008 at four geographically separate primary care outpatient practices in San Antonio, TX. Recruitment was completed by bilingual (Spanish/English) research assistants in the clinic waiting areas. The study sample included 208 older adults (age 60�C89) classified through self-report as either non-Hispanic white or Mexican American, who scored higher than 18 on the Mini Mental State Examination.

All subjects provided informed consent and both Institutional Review Boards (the University of Texas Health Science Center and the University of Texas at San Antonio) approved the one-hour interview study. All subjects took the interview in their language of preference (English or Spanish). For purposes of this study, attitudes of the 100 Mexican American subjects were examined.2.2. Outcome MeasureVentilator support attitudes were assessed by asking subjects to ��think about what things would be like if you were diagnosed as having a terminal illness, which means your health could not improve no matter what the doctor does.�� Subjects’ responses to the question, ��would you want to be connected Cilengitide to a machine to help you breathe?�� [4] were recorded on a four-point Likert scale ranging from ��strongly disagree�� to ��strongly agree.�� Scores were then dichotomized as strongly agree/agree versus strongly disagree/disagree.2.3. Other VariablesAge, gender, education, occupation, and marital status were collected as demographic measures.