Advance Health Care Directives and Living Wills for Clearlake Residents

Separate treatment preferences from choosing an agent

A directive can serve two related but distinct purposes: expressing your health-care wishes and identifying someone to make health-care decisions. Consider first what you want written instructions to communicate, then separately consider who you would want to make decisions. Naming a decision-maker does not, by itself, describe your treatment preferences; written wishes address a different part of the planning conversation.

This page focuses on documenting preferences and making the document accessible. If you are still deciding whom to name as a health-care decision-maker, treat that as a separate question rather than assuming that the written instructions resolve it.

• What preferences do you want the document to express?
• Who may need to know that the document exists and where it can be found?
• Are you trying to record health-care wishes, identify a decision-maker, or address both?

Clarify the role of each document

An advance health care directive concerns health-care wishes and health-care decisions. A financial power of attorney serves a different financial role. Do not assume that a document addressing one role communicates instructions for the other. Before relying on paperwork, identify what each document is meant to do and whether it addresses the question your family is trying to answer.

The same care is useful when reviewing related arrangements. Ask what a document or arrangement is intended to cover, who is meant to act under it, and whether it speaks to health-care decisions or to a different matter. Those are clarifying questions, not a substitute for advice about a particular document or arrangement.

• What decisions or wishes does this document address?
• Does another document serve a separate financial purpose?
• Who should be able to locate the relevant information when it is needed?

Make the document findable

Preparing a directive and keeping the relevant documents accessible are separate from registering information about an executed directive. Registration is not a substitute for thinking through who needs to know where the document is kept. Families can discuss how the document will be located and shared, and whether information about an executed directive should also be registered.

As a practical preparation step, gather the documents you want to discuss and make a simple list of where they are kept and whom you have told. The goal is to make the location clear to the people who may need the information, rather than assuming that completing a document alone will make it readily available.

• Identify the current location of the relevant documents.
• Consider which trusted people should know how to find them.
• Note any questions about registering information for discussion.

Plan with Codi M. Dada Law Office P.C.

Codi M. Dada Law Office P.C. has one in-person office at 802 Grant Ave, Novato, California, and provides virtual services throughout California, including Clearlake. A planning conversation can help you organize the questions you have about written health-care preferences, the separate role of a decision-maker, and how relevant documents will be available to your family.

Before the conversation, bring the documents you want to discuss and note what you want your written preferences to communicate. Also list any uncertainty about who should be able to find the documents or how different paperwork serves different purposes. This gives the discussion a concrete starting point without presuming that one document answers every question.