I have a new hero:

Great-grandma tattoos "DO NOT RESUSCITATE" on her chest

Dyersville, Ia. -- Eighty-year-old Mary Wohlford has informed family members of her wishes should she ever become incapacitated. She also has signed a living will that hangs on the side of her refrigerator.

But the retired nurse and great-grandmother now believes she has removed all potential for confusion.

She had the words "DO NOT RESUSCITATE" tattooed on her chest....

Wohlford said she is healthy; in fact, she cares part-time for two other women. She said her decision to enter a Galena, Ill., tattoo parlor in February was the culmination of what she witnessed during her almost 30 years in nursing and during the Terri Schiavo controversy last year....

If Terri Schiavo had a "Do Not Resuscitate" tattoo, Wohlford said, "then her husband could have said, 'See, it's right here. This is what she wanted.' But she verbalized it, so they had this big rigmarole."...

Apparently, it doesn't have the force of law. But I can't blame her for wanting to do something to make her wishes abundantly, unmistakably clear.



Bill Frist, your thoughts?

(Via Guardian Unlimited Newsblog.)