Health Care Directives And Living Wills: Ensuring Your Wishes Are Honored In Florida
Like many other states, Florida allows individuals to fill out health care directives, which include documents such as living wills and designations of health care surrogates. These documents can help to ensure that your wishes are honored. However, you may not be familiar with the different documents you can fill out, what they mean, or what to include in them. You do not have to try to navigate these forms alone. An experienced Boca Raton, Florida estate planning attorney with Loughlin Law, P.A. may be able to assist you with completing these documents and making sure your wishes are known. Call (561) 677-8384 to schedule a consultation in our office.
What Are Health Care Directives?
Health care directives are legal forms that allow individuals to state their medical care preferences if they are unable to make their own decisions. These documents include living wills, designations of health care surrogates or durable medical power of attorney, organ donation or anatomical donation designations, and do-not-resuscitate orders. While many of these forms can be completed by the individual with or without the assistance of an attorney, some require a doctor to complete them, such as do-not-resuscitate orders.
While these documents are not legally required, FL §765.102 provides that every competent adult has the right to make their own medical decisions and to protect that right, allows them to complete such documents to ensure that those wishes are honored. Without these documents, others will make decisions on the individual’s behalf and may not make the decisions the individual would have wanted. These others can include spouses, adult children, adult siblings, parents, or an individual appointed by the court.
What Are Living Wills?
Living wills are a type of health care directive. A living will allows any competent adult who completes one to express their wishes for end-of-life medical care. This document specifically addresses care when the individual is terminally ill, has an end-stage condition, or is in a persistent vegetative state. In other words, a living will should stipulate the individual’s wishes when they are going to die, indicating whether they want to prolong their life with artificial methods such as artificial hydration or nutrition, mechanical respiration, cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR), or other life-prolonging treatments. These treatments will not cure the terminal condition or make the individual better, but simply allow the body to continue living. FL §765.302 requires physicians to make a living will or a copy of it part of the patient’s medical records as soon as they are made aware of them.
Living wills are often a key part of estate planning. Many people are very clear about whether they wish to have life-prolonging treatments or not, but if their loved ones are not emotionally prepared for their death, there could be disputes regarding which treatments to proceed with. Living wills can avoid these disputes, by not only spelling out the individual’s wishes clearly, but also giving medical professionals a legal document they are required to honor, even if the family does not agree with what the individual wanted.
What Is a Designation of Health Care Surrogate?
Designation of a health care surrogate (DHCS), also known as a durable power of attorney (POA) for health care, appoints an agent to make health care decisions or receive protected health information on the principal’s (the person who granted the designation) behalf. A medical POA allows the agent to make health care decisions when the principal is incapacitated but not terminal. Examples of times when the agent can make decisions include if the principal is in a coma, unconscious, has dementia, or is under anesthesia for a medical procedure.
A medical POA does not override a living will. If the individual has both a health care POA and a living will, the POA for health care will be effective before the individual is considered terminal. After medical providers have determined the individual has a terminal or end-stage condition or is in a persistent vegetative state, the agent would be required to follow the guidance of the living will in any decisions they make. Additionally, if the POA for health care contains specific directions, such as declining specific treatments), the agent cannot override these directions.
What Other Directives Can I Complete?
While living wills and DHCS designations are the most commonly completed forms, and the most used, there are other health care directives that can be completed. Organ donation designations, or anatomical donation designations, allow the individual to indicate whether they wish to donate their organs, and if so, whether they want to donate them to save another individual’s life or donate them to science, such as donating their entire body to be used by medical school students. The Florida Driver’s Handbook also stipulates on page 12 that this designation can also be noted on the individual’s Florida driver’s license, though the license will not indicate the exact use they want for their donated organs.
Do-not-resuscitate orders are another form that individuals may want to complete. This form indicates that if they go into cardiac or respiratory distress, they do not wish to be resuscitated. This form cannot be completed by the patient with their attorney. Instead, the Florida Department of Health indicates this form must be printed on yellow paper to be valid and must be completed by the patient and their health care provider. This form is a two-part document, with one part being the form itself and the second part being able to be cut off, folded in half, and used as a wallet card to indicate the individual does not want to be resuscitated. The wallet card is exactly the same as the form, simply in a smaller format.
Can I Change My Mind After Filling Out Health Care Directives?
Many times, individuals will complete health care directives with clear instructions about their wishes, but as they age or when they are diagnosed with a health condition, they may change their mind regarding their wishes. Fortunately, individuals can change their mind anytime they want regarding their living wills or other health care directives. They must put these changes in writing, and sign and date the changes, for them to take effect. A compassionate estate planning attorney with Loughlin Law, P.A. may be able to assist you with updating your health care directives.
The individual can also change their mind by an oral statement, physical destruction of the original directive, or writing a new directive. However, it is recommended that when an individual changes any of their health care directives, including living wills, that they physically destroy any previous versions of the forms and only keep a copy of the most recent and current form. This will eliminate any confusion or doubt about which version the individual would want honored in the event that any of the documents are needed.
What Should I Do With Health Care Directives After I Complete Them?
In order to be honored, health care directives must be available to loved ones and medical professionals who would need them. If an individual wants to authorize an agent in a DHCS, they should first speak with that person and confirm that they agree to be their agent. If they do, the principal should give them a copy of the POA and go over their wishes so the agent is aware of what they want if the POA should ever need to be used.
Another copy of the POA, as well as any living wills, organ donation designations, and other related documents, should be stored in a safe location. Many people choose to store them in a safety deposit box in a bank, a fireproof safe at home, or in a filing cabinet. Wherever the individual chooses to store the documents, they should tell someone where they are and ensure they have a key, keycode, password, or other things needed to access the documents. Additionally, the individual should also keep a card or paper in their wallet or purse that indicates they have these documents and where they are located. This card alerts health care providers to the existence of these documents so they can ask family about them.
How an Estate Planning Attorney Can Assist You
No one should ever have to trust another to make their health care decisions for them, and no one should ever have to try to guess what a loved one would want in making decisions for them. Health care directives, including living wills and designations of health care surrogates, can ensure that you make your own decisions and provide clear guidance to loved ones and medical professionals about the care you would want. While these forms do not require an attorney to complete, an attorney may be able to assist by ensuring all the legal requirements for each document are met, talking with you to help you determine what your wishes are when you are not completely clear, and helping you ensure the rest of your estate plan is updated. Call Loughlin Law, P.A. at (561) 677-8384 to schedule a consultation with one of our compassionate Boca Raton estate planning attorneys and learn more about ensuring your health care wishes are honored in Florida.
