Advance Health Care Directives and Living Wills for Portola Residents

Start by separating instructions from decision-making authority

A useful first question is whether your priority is to record treatment preferences, identify someone to make health-care decisions, or address both. An advance health care directive can do both: express health-care wishes and identify a person to make health-care decisions. Those are related purposes, but they are not the same choice. You may want to consider separately what guidance you want recorded and whom you want identified to make decisions.

This distinction helps keep the planning discussion focused. A document that identifies a decision-maker does not, by that fact alone, tell you what treatment preferences you want written down. Likewise, writing preferences does not answer whether the person you identify is the right person to make decisions.

• What health-care wishes do you want the document to express?
• Who do you want identified to make health-care decisions?
• Do your existing documents still reflect your preferences and choice of person?

Compare the documents by the decisions they address

When reviewing existing paperwork, compare an advance health care directive with a financial power of attorney rather than treating them as interchangeable. The directive addresses health-care wishes and health-care decision-making; a financial power of attorney serves a different financial role. If you are considering a change, first identify which document addresses the concern. A change to one does not, by itself, answer whether the other still reflects your intentions.

For example, if your concern is who may make health-care decisions, focus the discussion on the directive. If your concern is financial decision-making, note that separately for review of the financial power of attorney. This is a way to organize questions, not a conclusion about what any individual should sign or change.

Make preferences useful to the people who may need them

Preparing relevant documents and keeping them accessible are practical parts of planning. Consider where your current documents are kept and how the people who may need to refer to them could find them. If you are preparing for a conversation, gather the documents you already have and note any preferences or choices you want to revisit. These steps can help clarify what you want to discuss without assuming that a particular document needs to be changed.

Registration is a separate consideration from preparing and keeping documents accessible. Information about an executed directive may be registered, but registering information is not the same task as preparing the directive itself. Consider the two questions separately: what document or information should be available, and how will the relevant people be able to access it?

Prepare for a focused planning conversation

Before seeking guidance, bring together any advance health care directive and financial power of attorney you have, and write down what you want each document to accomplish. Note whether your main concern is the written health-care wishes, the person identified to make health-care decisions, or keeping the relevant paperwork accessible. If more than one concern applies, listing them separately can make it easier to decide what to address first.

Codi M. Dada Law Office P.C. serves clients virtually throughout California from its Novato office. A focused next step is to discuss which document relates to your concern and whether your current planning still matches your preferences.