What is a living will?
What is a living will?
A living will, known in most states as a Directive to Physicians or Healthcare Directive, sets out your wishes about what extended medical treatment should be withheld or provided if you become unable to communicate those wishes. The directive creates a contract with the attending doctor. Once the doctor receives a properly signed and witnessed directive, he or she is under a duty either to honor its instructions or to make sure you are transferred to the care of another doctor who will.
Many people mistakenly believe that healthcare directives are used only to instruct doctors to withhold life prolonging treatments. In fact, some people want to reinforce that they would like to receive all medical treatment that is available -- and a healthcare directive is the proper place to say so.
What is a durable power of attorney for healthcare? Doesn't that do the same thing as a living will?
A durable power of attorney for healthcare -- called a healthcare proxy in some states -- gives another person authority to make medical decisions for you if you are unable to make them for yourself. Unlike a healthcare directive, this document doesn't necessarily state what type of treatment you want to receive. You can leave those decisions to your proxy if you feel comfortable doing so. Ideally, however, the two documents will work together. For example, your healthcare directive may contain a clause appointing a proxy (sometimes called an attorney-in-fact, agent or representative) to be certain your wishes are carried out as you've directed. Or you may create two separate documents, a directive explaining the treatment you wish to receive and a durable power of attorney appointing someone to oversee your directive.
If you do not know anyone you trust to name as your healthcare proxy, it is still important to complete and finalize a healthcare directive recording your wishes. That way, your doctors will still be obligated to give you the medical care you want.
What happens if I don't have any healthcare documents?
If you have not completed either a formal document such as a healthcare directive to express your wishes, or a durable power of attorney to appoint someone to make healthcare decisions on your behalf, the doctors who attend you will use their own discretion in deciding what kind of medical care you will receive.
When a question arises about whether surgery or some other serious procedure is authorized, doctors may turn for consent to a close relative -- spouse, parent or adult child. Friends and unmarried partners, although they may be most familiar with your wishes for your medical treatment, are rarely consulted, or are purposefully left out of the decision-making process.
Problems arise where partners and family members disagree about what treatment is proper. In the most complicated scenarios, these battles over medical care wind up in court, where a judge, who usually has little medical knowledge and no familiarity with you, is called upon to decide the future of your treatment. Such legal battles -- which are costly, time-consuming and usually painful to those involved -- are unnecessary if you have the care and foresight to use a formal document to express your wishes for your healthcare.
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