I think that's a very complicated issue, Mr. Lake.
It would take consultation with a capacity assessment expert and specialists who are familiar with young adults with disabilities to be able to spend.... A large amount of time would be required to really understand how to best communicate with this person and what level of understanding they have about their unique circumstances and their treatment options.
I can say that as the stakes get higher for decisions, such as a termination of a person's life—I don't think it gets any higher than that—the amount of time it takes to assess capacity needs to be equal to that. The head of the complex capacity assessments at McGill University has told me that her most complex cases take several hours to really understand the person's capacity. It's a very complicated situation.
Most MAID assessors do not have formal capacity training, at least in my experience, and that's the same experience that my colleague at McGill has expressed. Even when we ask for psychiatry to be consulted in these complex cases, it's not always happening. In fact, in examples that I've experienced, I've recommended capacity assessment because I didn't feel the person had medical decision-making abilities, and that was not followed. I even documented it in the medical record and raised my concern with the MAID team. That person went ahead and got MAID anyway. I was told that they do their own assessments for capacity.
I think it's very complicated, and we should be relying on experts when it comes to a matter of life and death.