Background Information about the Multilingual Hawaii Advance Directive
The Hawai‘i Advance Health Care Directive (HI AD) or ‘Advance Directive’ (AD) as it is commonly known, is a written statement about your future medical care. Starting June 2023 the HI AD is available in 12 languages. To facilitate the discussion for providers and loved ones, the HI AD is a bilingual document translated content block by content block.
Please keep in mind that most providers speak English only. To ensure that your wishes and instructions are understood and can be honored, please fill out your Hawai’i Advance Directive in English. In order to complete an advance directive you need to either have two witnesses or a notary public for it to be valid.
Important limitation: If you choose to complete the English portion of a bilingual HI AD, State of Hawai‘i regulations require a bilingual Notary to notarize your bilingual version of the advance directive. – More below –
Chinese simplified Hawaii Advance Health Care Directive
Chinese traditional Hawaii Advance Health Care Directive
Chuukese Hawaii Advance Health Care Directive
Ilocano Hawaii Advance Health Care Directive
Japanese Hawaii Advance Health Care Directive
Korean Hawaii Advance Health Care Directive
Marshallese Hawaii Advance Health Care Directive
Samoan Hawaii Advance Health Care Directive
Spanish Hawaii Advance Health Care Directive
Tagalog Hawaii Advance Health Care Directive
Tongan Hawaii Advance Health Care Directive
Vietnamese Hawaii Advance Health Care Directive
Please make sure that you visit:
The English Advance Directive page or download the English PDF of the Advance Directive
More on the bilingual notary in Hawai‘i:
“The notarization of a document that has been written in a foreign language should only be performed by a notary who has a thorough understanding of the foreign language in which the document and/or notarial certificate are written.” […] Similarly, a notary should not notarize a document written in English if the parties to the document who appear before the notary do not appear to speak, read, or understand English.” Page 5, Notary Manual 2010 (download PDF file from the state’s website 12 MB. Please note that this is an external link not maintained by Kōkua Mau).
Call the Notary Public Program (808) 586-1216 for a bilingual notary, or go to their website ‘Online Notary‘ (‘Search Category’: choose ‘Language’ in the fold down menu and in ‘Search Terms’ type in the language you want).
Please call the notary public office (808) 586-1216 if you have more questions regarding using a bilingual notary.
Two recommendations for completing your bilingual AD:
1) Use two witnesses to complete a bilingual HI AD. Witnesses cannot be health care providers (like a doctor, nurse or social worker), employees of a health care facility, or the person you choose as an agent. One of the two persons cannot be related to you or have inheritance rights.
OR
2) Use a bilingual notary.
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