INTRODUCTION: Advance directives are documents by which a person makes provisions for health care decisions in the event that, in the future, that person becomes unable to make those decisions. There is a lack of studies on the knowledge and understanding towards advance directives among patients and their families. The purpose of this study is to address this lack of research regarding advance directives by measuring the level of knowledge and attitudes of families of hospitalized patients. METHODS: A descriptive, cross-sectional study design was used to describe the attitudes and the level of knowledge on advance directives of the families of patients. Data were collected directly by the researchers via assisted questionnaires. Descriptive statistics and frequencies were reported. RESULTS: A total of 79 participants consisting of immediate family members of patients from UERMMMCI were enrolled. Only 24% reported having discussed advance directives with the patient's physician. Those respondents whose families had no discussion with their physician about advance directives had the same score as those who had. Overall, 61% of participants have only medium to low knowledge of advance directives, while 70% have positive attitudes regarding advance directives. CONCLUSION The study showed that the family members of patients had a reasonable understanding of advance directives in terms of basic knowledge, and positive attitudes on advance directives. Those who denied having discussed advance directives were comparable in the knowledge of advance directives with those who did.