Whether you are young or old, healthy or battling an ongoing illness, planning for your future medical care is an important part of estate planning. Too many people end up incapacitated in the hospital without any sort of plan in place for the care they wish to receive. In these situations, doctors and the patient’s family members are left to guess what the individual might have wanted. An advance healthcare directive is just one type of legal estate planning tool that can be used to provide clear directions for your healthcare providers so that you receive the precise types of treatment that you want, even when you cannot communicate with your treating physician. Advance directives are part of the larger picture of estate planning that the attorneys at Strategic Counsel Law Group, L.C. can help you with.
What is an Advance Directive?
An advance directive (also called a living will) is a legal document that enables medical decisions to be made for you if you become incapacitated or otherwise unable to make important healthcare decisions for yourself. An advance directive tells your doctors and loved ones what type of treatment you want to receive in a given scenario, taking the guesswork out of the equation. As such, advance directives provide ease of mind to your loved ones during otherwise very troubling times.
What Should be Included in My Advance Directive?
Advance directives are used to take the ambiguity out of your end-of-life care. Many people put specific instructions in their advance directives pertaining to the following:
- Whether or not to perform CPR
- The use of artificial nutrients through feeding tubes or IVs
- When or when not to be placed on a ventilator
- Whether or not you wish to be placed on dialysis if your kidneys fail
- What types of comfort care (palliative care) do you want to receive
- Whether or not you wish to donate organs or your body
Individuals Who May Benefit From Creating an Advance Healthcare Directive
- Patients with a chronic progressive illness, such as cancer, COPD, multiple sclerosis, diabetes, or Parkinson’s
- Individuals who are at risk of stroke or heart attack
- Patients with Alzheimer’s or dementia who can no longer make legal healthcare decisions for themselves (advance care directive must be created before anyone is deemed legally incompetent, which is why it is best to start estate planning sooner rather than later)
- Everyone else—all of us are at risk of accidental injuries such as slip and falls, work accidents, and traffic collisions
Our Advance Care Directive Attorneys Can Help You Get Started Today
There is no single type of person or age group that benefits from an advance care directive; advance care directives benefit everyone, and particularly their family members. An advance care directive absolves your family members from the responsibility of making potentially end-of-life decisions for you. Advance care directives are just one aspect of estate planning that the Strategic Counsel Law Group, L.C., can handle for you. Call our advance healthcare directive attorneys today at 813-286-1700 to schedule a free consultation.
