St. Petersburg Health Care Surrogate Attorney

Families deal with enough stress when a loved one begins to decline and cannot make decisions on their own. They may end up in conflict when they cannot agree on medical decisions for their loved one. At the same time, they also need to be able to make decisions quickly in emergencies. Preparation and planning are vital in this area.

As you or a loved one ages, it is critical to have someone in place who has the power to make healthcare decisions. Even if there is no healthcare emergency, you should have this structure in place. You never know when tragedy or a crisis can strike.

Here, you would execute a healthcare directive to allow someone to act as a surrogate. This is a necessary part of every estate plan. Not only do you need this instrument executed, but it needs to be done correctly.

Get Legal Help to Make Sure it's Right

Many people try to use a form that they find on the internet to execute a health care surrogate arrangement. This is not always the best thing because a mistake could plunge your family into a crisis at a time when you least need it. The language on a standard pre-printed form may not be broad enough to allow someone to fully act.

Before you designate someone to make critical healthcare decisions, you need to discuss your overall estate plan with your family. This is one part of a multi-faceted plan, and you should not piecemeal your estate planning. Usually, a healthcare surrogate appointment accompanies the living will.

In other words, the health care surrogate planning should be part of a larger discussion. Denyse D. Kruse could sit down with you and your family, so you can begin to discuss goals and plans. This is not an easy conversation to have, but it is a necessary one. Your family needs to know your medical wishes, so they could make the proper decisions when the time comes.

What a Health Care Surrogate Could Do

In the meantime, know that the person who holds the health care surrogate has an incredible amount of responsibility for your health. Your surrogate can communicate on your behalf with medical professionals, provide useful information to the medical professionals, provide consent to move forward with medical treatments, or refuse consent to move forward with medical treatments.

Finally, you should know the risks of not having a health care surrogate in place. If you do not have this document in place and you are unable to communicate your wishes to medical professionals, those medical professionals do not have to communicate with your loved ones or provide any information to them. This is even true for spouses! If you do not have a valid healthcare surrogate, medical professionals do not have to communicate with your spouse or take direction from your spouse. If you are unable to make your own medical decisions or communicate those decisions, the court may appoint a guardian to act on your behalf. This may not be a person that you wanted, but you have no say when it reaches the courts.

Contact an Experienced Health Care Surrogate Attorney

Kruse Law can answer questions about a healthcare surrogate and everything else that you need to know about an estate plan. Call today at (727) 256-4860 or contact us online to learn how you can get peace of mind from an estate plan.