Advance Health Care Directives and Living Wills for Inglewood Residents

Separate your wishes from the authority to decide

Start by asking what you need the document to do. If your priority is communicating treatment preferences, focus on the written instructions you want recorded. If you also want a person to make health-care decisions, consider that as a separate choice within the advance health care directive. A directive can address both wishes and decision-making authority, but recording preferences and selecting an agent are not the same task.

This page focuses on documenting treatment preferences, not on choosing or evaluating a health-care agent. You can consider the two questions together while keeping clear which one you are addressing: what do you want communicated, and who, if anyone, should be authorized to decide?

• Write down the preferences you want to communicate.
• Separately consider whether you want to identify someone to make health-care decisions.

Clarify what the document is meant to cover

Before preparing a directive, identify the treatment preferences you want reflected and the situations or decisions you want to discuss. Use plain-language notes to organize your thoughts; these notes are preparation, not a substitute for the directive itself. If you are uncertain how to describe a preference, make that uncertainty a question for a planning conversation rather than treating a general phrase as a settled instruction.

A directive concerns health-care wishes and decisions. It does not serve the same role as a financial power of attorney, which addresses financial matters. If your concern is who can handle money or other financial affairs, that is a different planning question and should not be treated as answered by health-care instructions.

• List the preferences you want to communicate and any points you want clarified.
• Keep health-care decision planning separate from questions about financial authority.

Ask the ownership and access question

The practical question that can change your next step is: who has the relevant document, and can the people who may need it locate it? Preparing a directive and keeping it accessible are separate from registering information about an executed directive. Registration is not a substitute for making sure the document itself can be found when needed.

As a preparation step, make a simple list of where you intend to keep the document and whom you want to know how to locate it. This is an organizational suggestion, not a legal requirement. If you are considering registry information, distinguish that task from preparing and keeping the directive accessible.

• Decide how you will keep the directive accessible.
• Consider who should know where to locate it.
• Treat registration information and access to the document as separate matters.

Prepare for a focused planning conversation

Bring your written preferences, unresolved questions, and a clear sense of whether you want the document to record instructions, identify a decision-maker, or address both. If you already have planning documents, note their names and where they are kept so the discussion can distinguish health-care instructions from financial authority. You do not need to resolve every question before asking for help; identifying what remains uncertain is useful preparation.

Codi M. Dada Law Office P.C. can discuss advance health care directives and living wills with clients in Inglewood through virtual services. The firm’s only in-person office is in Novato. A next step is to organize your preferences and questions, then contact the firm to discuss your planning needs.