Riverside Advance Health Care Directives and Living Wills

Plan for instructions and decision-making separately

An advance health care directive can do two different things: express your health-care wishes and identify someone to make health-care decisions. Those are related choices, but they are not interchangeable. Written instructions communicate preferences; naming a person identifies someone for health-care decisions.

Start by asking yourself two questions: What would I want others to know about my health-care preferences? Who would I want to make decisions if a decision is needed? Thinking through each question separately can make it easier to see whether your document reflects both parts of your plan.

This page concerns recorded health-care preferences and their availability. Choosing a health-care agent is a distinct planning decision; it should not be treated as settled simply because you have written instructions, or vice versa.

• Consider what preferences you want the document to communicate.
• Separately consider who you want identified to make health-care decisions.
• If you are uncertain whether a proposed instruction or designation expresses your intent, make that question part of a planning discussion.

Know which responsibilities belong to which document

A person identified in an advance health care directive is named in connection with health-care decisions. A financial power of attorney serves a different financial role. Naming someone for health-care decisions does not, by itself, answer who should handle financial matters.

A useful way to check your plan is to list the decisions you are trying to address, then identify which document or person you expect to address each one. If a question concerns finances rather than health care, do not assume the health-care directive supplies that separate authority. Consider whether you need to discuss a financial power of attorney as a separate planning matter.

The practical consequence is that a document may communicate health-care preferences without resolving every question about who handles other affairs. Where you are unsure what authority a document provides, ask about its role before relying on it.

Make your preferences usable by the people who may need them

Preparing a document and keeping it accessible are distinct from registering information about an executed directive. A plan is more useful when the relevant document can be found by the people who may need to refer to it. Think about where you will keep it and how the person you identify, if any, can learn where it is.

As a practical preparation step, write down the document’s location and the names of people you expect to need access. You can also note any questions you want to resolve about what the document says or who should have it. These are organizational steps, not a substitute for deciding what the document should communicate.

Registration is a separate consideration from preparing and keeping the document available. It does not replace the document itself or the practical question of whether the relevant people can locate it.

• Identify where the document will be kept.
• Consider who may need to know its location.
• Keep questions about the document’s meaning or intended role separate from the logistics of finding it.

Prepare for a focused planning conversation

Before a planning conversation, gather any existing health-care directive or related planning documents you want to discuss. Make a short list of preferences you want reflected, questions about the person you may identify, and any uncertainty about whether a separate financial document is needed. This can help keep the discussion centered on the choices you actually need to make.

Codi M. Dada Law Office P.C. has one in-person office in Novato and provides virtual services throughout California, including Riverside. A next step is to identify the decisions you want your plan to address and arrange a discussion about how written health-care instructions and the decision-maker role fit together.