What did the Nancy Cruzan case mean for us?

Twenty years ago, William Colby argued the Nancy Cruzan case before the US Supreme Court. What did the Cruzan case mean for all of us? Have we made progress making our wishes known for the end of life? In this interview, Colby describes the impact in 1987 of seeing Nancy Cruzan — eyes open and moving around yet unconscious — as the beginning of his education about persistent vegetative state, how hard it is to understand, the challenges her family faced, and the implications for the future as technology such as feeding tubes continues to evolve. Colby presented his reflections on the case at a Center for Practical Bioethics lecture on October 14, 2009. (Sept. 30, 2009)