A record 60 percent of people recently surveyed by the health ministry said they favor preparing advance documents to refuse artificial life-support in the event they become terminally ill.

The figure indicates that more people want to make their own decisions on the steps that should be taken when they are dying, reflecting the increasingly important role palliative treatment will take in Japan's aging society.

The survey, conducted by the ministry every five years, saw 59 percent of pollees laud the concept of a living will that clearly states their refusal of life-support when there is no hope of recovery.

The Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry conducted the survey in March on some 6,500 people aged 20 and older.

As well as members of the general public, doctors, nurses and caregivers were surveyed.

The 59 percent who favor living wills compares with the 48 percent who expressed this wish in the 1998 poll and the 51 percent in 1993.

The figure stood at 75 percent for doctors, up from 70 percent five years earlier, and 75 percent for nurses, up from 69 percent in 1998. Among caregivers, to whom questionnaires were sent as a group for the first time, 76 percent supported living wills.

Of the general public respondents, 74 percent said that if they become terminally ill and are in pain, they would not want to receive treatment solely for the purpose of prolonging their lives.

This compares with 68 percent in the previous survey.

Doctors sharing this view accounted for 82 percent, up from 81 percent, while the figure stood at 87 percent for nurses, up from 82 percent, and 83 percent for caregivers.

Of the general public respondents who held this view, 59 percent said they would prioritize treatment that mitigates pain. This figure stood at 84 percent for doctors.

The survey shows a clear difference between the general public and medical practitioners on where they wish to spend their last days.

Asked where they would like to receive treatment in old age when death is near, 38 percent of the general public, the largest group, said they would want to be in a hospital.

Many said that the burden on their families would be too great if they were to stay at home.

Only 23 percent of the general public said they would choose their homes, though 49 percent of doctors and around 40 percent of nurses and caregivers said they would prefer to die at home.