New
Florida & Federal Laws Can Benefit You
Florida Designation
of Healthcare Surrogate Law
You may
know that this document allows you to name a trusted person to make your
healthcare decisions if you are temporarily or permanently incapacitated and
unable to give informed medical consent. It
allows your medical decisions to be made privately without court involvement. Now you have the following choices:
- The authority of your medical decision-maker can start immediately or
- The
authority of your medical decision-maker becomes effective only when your
physician examines you and determines that you cannot give informed consent and - The
ability of your medical decision-maker to obtain your healthcare information
can start immediately or - The
ability of your medical decision-maker to obtain your healthcare information
can start only if you are incapacitated. - This new law is effective October 1, 2015. Any Designation of Healthcare Surrogate signed prior to October 1st is still valid. If you would like to take advantage of the new law have your document updated.
Medicare to
Pay for End of Life Planning Discussions with Your Physician
Starting Jan. 1, Medicare
will reimburse physician discussions with patients about end-of-life treatment
options.
- The new regulation requires only that Medicare cover end-of-life consultations for patients who want it.
- The "voluntary advance care planning" as it referred to will take place during annual wellness visits.
- The new Medicare rule will pay for elective annual discussions about end-of-life plans, which can, in turn, be used to prepare an advance directive stating what treatments a patient would want and treatments they would not want.
Maintain privacy, avoid guardianship and
probate.
Call our office at 954-382-1997 to schedule a consultation to discuss
your estate and healthcare planning goals. Properly drafter estate &
incapacity documents and advance directives will give you peace of mind.
We are your trusted
planning advisor through life sm
