The Basics

Your health and wellness are personal to you. While you want to ensure that you retain your ability to make health care decisions for yourself for the remainder of your life, that's not always the case. Unforeseen circumstances arise, necessitating the ability for someone else to make quick decisions on your behalf.

A Durable Health Care Power of Attorney ("POA") appoints someone else to make decisions on your behalf for times when you cannot do so yourself. These decisions include course of treatment decisions, hiring and firing doctors, or, in the worst case scenario, deciding whether or not to withdraw care.

What's with the "Durable" part?

Good question. Traditionally, powers of attorney ended when the principal (the person making the document) no longer had mental or physical capacity. That meant that their agent (the person acting on their behalf) had no ability to make decisions for them. Because that approach is stupid, many states adopted "durable" powers of attorney to ensure that the power granted to the agent extends to periods in which the principal is incapacitated. This provides ultimate protection for the principal and the agent.

The Details

A Durable Health Care POA is available in all GoGo Estate plans. The standard Durable Health Care POA is effective as soon as you sign it, meaning that your designated agent has the authority to act on your behalf now, not sometime in the future. This is advantageous because in the event of an emergency, your agent may need to act quickly.

Don't worry too much about your agent's authority, however. While you are still alive and competent to make your own decisions, you can override any decision made by your agent while acting on your behalf. This means that you have ultimate control over your course of treatment decisions. Your agent is just there to provide additional support in the event of an emergency.

In the GoGo Estate Questionnaire, you will be asked to appoint your agent. If you are married or in a domestic partnership, your spouse or partner will automatically be deemed your agent under the Durable Health Care POA form. If you're single, you can pick whomever you feel best to handle your health care needs.

The powers granted to your agent in the Durable Health Care POA include the power to:

  1. Consent, refuse, or withdraw to medical treatment on your behalf
  2. To hire and fire doctors
  3. Authorize the release of medical records
  4. Contract with health care professionals
  5. Admit and discharge you from hospitals
  6. Provide for pain relief medication (including morphine)
  7. Make end-of-life care decisions for you (in the event that you do not have an Advanced Directive)

Hospitals and health care providers are authorized to rely on the statements and course of treatment decisions made by your agent unless you tell them otherwise. Moreover, if you are married or in a domestic partnership, if you get divorced or split up, your spouse or partner's ability to act on your behalf terminates automatically, meaning they will no longer have control over your health care needs.

Create a Durable Health Care POA

Once again, a Durable Health Care POA is available in all GoGo Estate plans. Whether you want a standalone document, or you want a more comprehensive estate plan, GoGo Estate has your back. Get a Durable Health Care Power of Attorney today!