To fill out Oklahoma’s advance directive for health care, download the free statutory form from the Oklahoma State Department of Health, decide what you want in each of three parts (a living will, a healthcare proxy appointment, and anatomical gifts), and sign it in front of two qualified witnesses. You can complete any combination of the three parts. Once signed and witnessed, the directive binds your doctors whenever two physicians determine you can no longer communicate your own choices.
Where to Get the Form
The Oklahoma State Department of Health posts the official statutory form on its Advance Directives page in PDF and Word format at no cost.1Oklahoma State Department of Health. Advance Directives No attorney is required. If your situation is complicated (assets in multiple states, unusual medical instructions), a lawyer’s review is worth the money, but most people can fill the form out themselves.
Part I: The Living Will
Part I asks what you want done, or not done, in three specific medical situations. For each one, you initial exactly one of four options.
Terminal Condition
Oklahoma defines a terminal condition as an incurable and irreversible condition that, even with life-sustaining treatment, will result in death within six months in the opinion of two physicians.2Justia. Oklahoma Code 63-3101.4 – Advance Directive Your four choices are:
- Stop life-sustaining treatment but keep artificially administered nutrition and hydration.
- Stop everything, including tube feeding.
- Continue all treatment and tube feeding.
- See paragraph (4), meaning you will write your own specific instructions in the “Other” section at the end of Part I.
Persistent Unconsciousness
This scenario applies when two physicians determine you have an irreversible condition in which thought and awareness of yourself and your surroundings are absent.3Oklahoma Legal Research System. Oklahoma Code 63-3101.3 – Definitions The same four options appear. Initial one.
End-Stage Condition
An end-stage condition means severe and permanent deterioration from injury, disease, or illness that leaves you completely physically dependent and incompetent, where treating the underlying condition would be medically ineffective.2Justia. Oklahoma Code 63-3101.4 – Advance Directive Same four options. Pick one.
Paragraph (4): Custom Instructions
If you chose “see paragraph (4)” in any of the three scenarios, write your specific wishes here. You can also use this space to address conditions the form doesn’t cover explicitly, such as advanced dementia, or to add preferences about pain management and palliative care. Initial the section if you use it.
The Nutrition and Hydration Rule
Oklahoma treats decisions about artificial nutrition and hydration as especially significant. If you use the official statutory form and initial one of the built-in options, you have already satisfied the law. If you draft your own advance directive outside the statutory form, it will not be read as authorizing the withdrawal of artificial nutrition or hydration unless that authorization appears in a separate section, paragraph, or subdivision that deals only with nutrition and hydration, and you separately initial or sign that section.2Justia. Oklahoma Code 63-3101.4 – Advance Directive A general “withdraw all treatment” line in a homemade document is not enough by itself.
Part II: Naming a Healthcare Proxy
Part II lets you appoint someone to make medical decisions for you if two physicians determine you can no longer make them yourself. Write in a primary healthcare proxy and an alternate who steps in if the primary is unavailable or unwilling to serve.2Justia. Oklahoma Code 63-3101.4 – Advance Directive
Your proxy can make any treatment decision you could make if you were able, with one important limit. Decisions about life-sustaining treatment and artificial nutrition or hydration can only be made according to what you wrote in Part I. The proxy fills gaps the living will doesn’t cover, such as choosing between two viable treatments, consenting to surgery, or authorizing a transfer, but cannot override your written end-of-life choices. Pick someone you trust to advocate under pressure, and tell them you’ve named them before the document is ever needed.
Part III: Anatomical Gifts
The final substantive section lets you donate your body, organs, or tissues after death under the Uniform Anatomical Gift Act. Initial the purposes you consent to:
- Transplantation
- Therapy
- Advancement of medical science, research, or education
- Advancement of dental science, research, or education
You then choose whether to donate your entire body or list specific organs and tissues. Leaving Part III blank does not prevent donation through other channels like a donor registry; it simply means you have not made a gift through this document.
Signing and Witnessing
You must be at least 18 and of sound mind to sign.2Justia. Oklahoma Code 63-3101.4 – Advance Directive Two witnesses must watch you sign and then add their own signatures and addresses. Each witness must be at least 18 and cannot:
- Stand to inherit from you, whether as an heir at law, a beneficiary under your will, or the recipient of a bequest.
- Be related to you (the form’s general provisions state that witnesses “shall not be related to me”).
Oklahoma does not require notarization for the directive to be valid. The two-witness signature is the full execution standard. Notarizing does no harm and can help if the document is ever challenged.
The Pregnancy Exception
If you are known to be pregnant, your advance directive is not operative during the pregnancy. If pregnancy status is unknown, the physician is required to determine it where appropriate given your age and other relevant factors.4Oklahoma Legal Research System. Oklahoma Code 63-3101.8 Life-sustaining treatment continues for the duration of the pregnancy regardless of what your directive says.
After You Sign: Copies and Storage
A signed directive that nobody can find does nothing. Make copies for everyone who might need to act on it:
- Your healthcare proxy and alternate, who will present the document to medical staff when the time comes.
- Your primary care physician, so it can be scanned into your electronic medical record and pulled up during an emergency at any hospital in the same network.
- Family members, even those not named as proxy, so they know the directive exists and where the original is kept.
Oklahoma does not run a state electronic registry for advance directives. The State Department of Health lists publicly available registry services on its website, currently MyDirectives, but states that it neither endorses nor guarantees them.1Oklahoma State Department of Health. Advance Directives
Updating or Revoking the Directive
You can revoke your advance directive at any time, in any manner, regardless of your mental or physical condition. The revocation takes effect the moment it is communicated to your attending physician or another healthcare provider, either by you directly or by someone who witnessed the revocation.5New York Codes, Rules and Regulations. Oklahoma Statutes 63-3101.6 – Advance Directive Revocation “Any manner” covers tearing up the document, telling your doctor verbally, or signing a written revocation. The step people skip is making sure the revocation actually reaches the medical team. If it never lands in your chart, the old directive stands.
When your wishes change rather than disappear, the cleanest fix is to execute a new advance directive. The new document supersedes the old one, but retrieve and destroy earlier copies so nobody follows the wrong version.
Directives From Other States
Oklahoma honors an advance directive signed in another state if that document complied with the law of the state where it was executed, but only to the extent it does not exceed what Oklahoma law authorizes. Existing directives remain valid under this standard when you move here, though completing a new Oklahoma statutory form is the safer path because it matches the format Oklahoma hospitals expect.
Mental Health Treatment Is a Separate Form
Oklahoma has a separate Advance Directive for Mental Health Treatment governed by Title 43A, not the Title 63 statute that covers the healthcare form.6Justia. Oklahoma Statutes 43A-11-103 – Definitions It covers psychoactive medication, convulsive treatment, and voluntary admission to a facility for up to 28 days, uses its own form and execution process, and appoints its own decision-maker (called an attorney-in-fact rather than a healthcare proxy). Completing the standard advance directive for health care does not cover mental health treatment. If you want both, you need both documents.