Definitions

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  • The definitions as used in this chapter have the following meaning unless the context requires otherwise:
    • (a) “Attending physician” means the physician who has primary responsibility for the treatment and care of the patient.

    • (b) “Declaration” means a writing executed in accordance with the requirements of section 187(a) of this title.

    • (c) “Health-care provider” means a person who is licensed, certified, or otherwise authorized by the laws of this Territory to administer health care in the ordinary course of business or practice of a profession.

    • (d) “Life-sustaining treatment” means any medical procedure or intervention that, when administered to a qualified patient, will serve only to prolong the process of dying.

    • (e) “Permanently unconscious” means a condition lasting indefinitely, without change in which thought, feelings, sensations and awareness of self and environment are absent.

    • (f) “Person” means an individual, corporation, business trust, estate, trust, partnership, association, joint venture, government, governmental subdivision or agency, or any other legal or commercial entity.

    • (g) “Physician” means an individual licensed to practice medicine in this Territory.

    • (h) “Qualified patient” means a patient 18 or more years of age who has executed a declaration and who has been determined by the attending physician to be in a terminal condition or in a permanently unconscious state.

    • (i) “State” means a state, territory, or possession of the United States, the District of Columbia, or the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.

    • (j) “Terminal condition” means an incurable and irreversible condition that, without the administration of life-sustaining treatment, will, in the opinion of the attending physician, result in death within a relatively short time.


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