GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF NORTH CAROLINA
1983 SESSION

CHAPTER 313 
SENATE BILL 240 

AN ACT TO AMEND THE RIGHT TO A NATURAL DEATH ACT. 

The General Assembly of North Carolina enacts:

Section 1.  G.S. 90-320(a) is rewritten to read: 
"(a)	The General Assembly recognizes as a matter of public policy that an individual's rights include the right to a peaceful and natural death and that a patient or his representative has the fundamental right to control the decisions relating to the rendering of his own medical care, including the decision to have extraordinary means withheld or withdrawn in instances of a terminal condition. This Article is to establish an optional and nonexclusive procedure by which a patient or his representative may exercise these rights." 
Sec. 2.  G.S. 90-322(a)(2) is amended by deleting "by a majority of a committee of three physicians" and substituting "in writing by a physician other than the attending physician." 
Sec. 3.  The first sentence of G.S. 90-322(b) is amended by deleting "at the request" and substituting "with the concurrence". 
Sec. 4.  The second sentence of G.S. 90-322(b) is amended by deleting "are" and substituting "is" and further by inserting immediately after the words "may be" the words "withheld or". 
Sec. 5.  This act is effective upon ratification. 
In the General Assembly read three times and ratified, this the 16th day of May, 1983.