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Florida Statute 765.404 - Full Text and Legal Analysis Florida Statute 765.404 | Lawyer Caselaw & Research
Fla. Stat. § 765.404 (2026) Copy Cite Official Site Syfertize CourtListener Amendments
765.404 Persistent vegetative state.For persons in a persistent vegetative state, as determined by the person’s primary physician in accordance with currently accepted medical standards, who have no advance directive and for whom there is no evidence indicating what the person would have wanted under such conditions, and for whom, after a reasonably diligent inquiry, no family or friends are available or willing to serve as a proxy to make health care decisions for them, life-prolonging procedures may be withheld or withdrawn under the following conditions:
(1) The person has a judicially appointed guardian representing his or her best interest with authority to consent to medical treatment; and
(2) The guardian and the person’s primary physician, in consultation with the medical ethics committee of the facility where the patient is located, conclude that the condition is permanent and that there is no reasonable medical probability for recovery and that withholding or withdrawing life-prolonging procedures is in the best interest of the patient. If there is no medical ethics committee at the facility, the facility must have an arrangement with the medical ethics committee of another facility or with a community-based ethics committee approved by the Florida Bio-ethics Network. The ethics committee shall review the case with the guardian, in consultation with the person’s primary physician, to determine whether the condition is permanent and there is no reasonable medical probability for recovery. The individual committee members and the facility associated with an ethics committee shall not be held liable in any civil action related to the performance of any duties required in this subsection.
History.s. 33, ch. 99-331; s. 18, ch. 2015-153.

Cases Citing F.S. 765.404

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·In Re Guardianship of Schiavo, 780 So. 2d 176 (Fla. 2d DCA 2001).

Cited 15 times | Published | Florida 2nd District Court of Appeal | 2001 WL 55481

...McNoble, The Cruzan Decision—A Surgeon's Perspective, 20 Mem. St. U.L.Rev. 569, 610 n. 3 (1990); John B. Oldershaw, M.D., J.D., et al., Persistent Vegetative State: Medical, Religious, Economic and Legal Perspectives, 1 DePaul J. Health Care L. 495-536 (1997). [2] This case does not involve section 765.404, Florida Statutes (2000)....
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Cited as authorityIn Re Henson (2005)
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Cited as authority(citing case) (2005)
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This Florida statute resource is curated by Florida Bar member Graham W. Syfert, a Jacksonville, Florida personal injury and workers' compensation attorney (Florida Bar No. 39104). For legal consultation, call 904-383-7448.