Legal interventions for persons with dementia in the USA: ethical, policy and practical aspects

The US legal system has developed a number of methods by which the state or private parties may intervene to protect persons, including those with dementia, who lack sufficient cognitive or emotional capacity to make and express autonomous choices about various aspects of their lives. These interventions may be planned and voluntary or unplanned and involuntary. This article explores the ethical and cultural values underlying legal alternatives in the United States and their strengths and weaknesses when measured against those values. The article poses issues about which US policy makers, health and human service practitioners, and attorneys might seek wisdom from the various strategies that other countries have devised to deal with the challenge of protecting, but not overprotecting, their own citizens with dementia.