What is a Healthcare Power of Attorney, and what can it do for me?
A Healthcare Power of Attorney, also called a healthcare proxy in many states, empowers someone else to make health decisions for you if you are unable to communicate your own wishes. This generally covers instances where you are unconscious and a decision is needed regarding surgery or other treatment. Healthcare Power of Attorney documents compliment Living Wills in making sure your healthcare decisions are made by specific people you choose, in the order of your choosing, so doctors have specific people to turn to for a decision. The last decision of withholding or giving life support is made in advance by you in a Living Will. For more information on a living will, please see information on Living Wills.
Far too many times a doctor is stuck waiting for the closest living family members to agree on a medical decision. The patient may also not want those family members to make such decisions and would have wanted a close friend or other relative make those decisions. However, if they never bothered to put this in writing, then the patient is stuck. A wife may consider her husband too emotional and unable to make such decisions under stress, so she would prefer that her less emotional brother make these decisions. Or a husband may trust his wife’s judgment, but would want a friend to make healthcare decisions if the wife is unavailable rather than his own mother. A Healthcare Power of Attorney can prevent decision problems before they come up by putting these wishes in writing.
In short, you appoint the people you would want to make healthcare decisions for you if you were unable to make them yourself or if you were unable to communicate these wishes. The doctor is bound to follow the legitimate orders of you healthcare proxy even if the “next of kin” disagrees with the decision.
What does a Healthcare Power of Attorney not do?
What a Healthcare Power of Attorney does is simple to explain. However, it is also important to explain what it does not do. Far too many people have the wrong idea of what a healthcare power of attorney does, and they consequently avoid this document because they wish to maintain control over their own healthcare decisions.
First, a Healthcare Power of Attorney does not sign away your own rights to make medical decisions for yourself. As long as you are competent and able to communicate your wishes, then you make those decisions. It is only if you are incapable of handling decisions yourself that a healthcare power of attorney takes effect, and that must be determined by two attending physicians.
Next, your spouse and other close family members do not have the authority to veto your appointments. It is a myth that family members can step in and nullify a healthcare agent’s decisions just because they are related to you. If a doctor in North Carolina has done this to someone you know and not obeyed a properly executed healthcare power of attorney, then that doctor has broken the law. State laws protect your interest in appointing a healthcare agent specifically because the state realizes that you may not want your closest family members making medical decisions for you. After all, you know your family, and you would best understand how they would react in a medical crisis. It is then up to you to get a healthcare power of attorney or simply do nothing and allow your closest family members to make decisions for you. However, make no mistake about it–if you do nothing, then fighting siblings, arguing adult children, and a close relative you have not seen in years may be the ones making medical decisions for you.
Lastly (at least for this discussion), your healthcare power of attorney does not make your healthcare agent liable for your medical bills. Regardless of the treatment you receive at the direction of your healthcare agent, you (and/or your health insurance company under the terms of their contract with you) are still primarily responsible for the payment of medical bills. For this reason, many of the state-approved healthcare power of attorney forms and healthcare proxy forms specifically release the healthcare agent from any liability, financially and legally, for their decisions on your behalf. After all, in making a healthcare power of attorney, you are appointing people that will make decisions for you the way you would if you were capable of communicating them. Just because they made the decisions for you does not mean that they now have to pay the tab.
If you are interested in obtaining a healthcare power of attorney and other documents, then please proceed then proceed to the Questionnaire page and contact our office at (919) 844-7993, to schedule your free initial consultation.