Deciding who you will name as your health care agent is one of the more difficult and important decisions you can make when planning for the future. Your health care agent receives a durable power from you, which gives your agent the power to make medical decisions for you if …and when …you are incapacitated or otherwise unable to make medical decisions for yourself. That is serious stuff!

So, I am puzzled by this myth that I hear all too often:…”It really doesn’t matter who I name as my Health Care Agent, everything will work out fine…”

Maybe, and I really hope that it will! …But your primary concern when selecting a health care agent should be ‘trust’. This person who you select may be put in very difficult circumstances. So you need to be able to trust that this person will make healthcare decisions that you would make for you; not decisions that they would make for themselves or decisions other family members may want or insist upon. Also ‘assertiveness’ is a strong quality, to ensure that your medical decisions will be made and enforced. It is critical that whoever you chose will be assertive.

In addition to trust and assertiveness, here are some more  of the most basic factors to keep in mind when selecting your agent

Family Dynamics: It is unavoidable to avoid potential issues regarding your family when important medical decisions must be made. Families that may otherwise be harmonious may have sharply different ideas about end of life and quality of life issues. In addition, who you choose may cause hurt feelings amongst other family members. This should never cause you to name one person over another, but you should spend time with the people most likely to take offense in order to explain your choice. Using some of these factors to explain it (especially proximity, longevity and who you name as your financial agent) can reduce the chance of misunderstanding and family drama.

Proximity: While it is not necessary to have your health care agent live nearby, realize that if they are needed, they may need to spend weeks if not months at your location making decisions. This can be a perfectly valid reason to skip some obvious candidates and a great reason to explain to people why you chose one over another.

Longevity: It may be worth considering the expected longevity of your agent. It may make more sense to choose your spouse than your parents, or even your eldest child (if they are fully grown) over your spouse who has suffered a stroke.

Financial Agent (Power of Attorney) POA: Finally, realize that if you select one person as your financial agent or POA and choose someone else as your health care agent, this could end up conflicting. If you completely trust both parties, then this may not be a real problem. However, if your financial agent strongly disagrees with decisions your health care agent is making, he or she may delay in paying bills which can greatly affect the kind of care you actually receive.

Naming Several Health Care Agents: You should generally never name more than one health care agent. It may seem like the diplomatic solution to any family issues, but it is more likely to cause problems than solve them. It often results in family in-fighting and can strain or break relationships between people you care deeply about. It also can delay or cast doubt on decisions if one agent is unavailable and neither doctors nor courts want to follow through with questionable decisions. In a worst-case scenario, one agent could take a matter to court which would cause considerable delay and acrimony between the parties.

Attorney Mark Greene
Mark Greene & Associates
2048 Washington Street
Hanover, MA 02339
MarkGreeneLaw.com
(781) 792-0202
Mark@markgreenelaw.com

Naming Alternate Health Care Agents: Rather than name multiple agents, it makes more sense to name alternate agents. If your named agent is otherwise unable to perform his or her required duties, then the responsibility would fall to your alternate agent. This can also be a diplomatic way to deal with family issues, as people named as alternates would still feel trusted and included. You should, however, take the task of choosing an alternate just as seriously as naming the primary candidate. Never select someone you would not trust and really want making decisions for you simply to avoid family issues.

So, in short, the person you select as your health care agent should be comfortable with the idea of disagreeing with your family, friends and doctor, as well as being capable of taking the matter to court if need be… So once again, chose wisely!