Advance Healthcare Directive and Medical Power of Attorney

One part appoints a healthcare agent to speak for you. The other records what you want to happen. They are kept separate on purpose, because naming someone is a different decision from deciding what they should do.

Choose a willing adult who understands your values, can communicate under pressure, and will follow your instructions rather than substitute their own preferences. Availability matters as much as judgment — an agent who cannot be reached cannot help you.

Your first choice may be unavailable, unwilling, or unable to serve when the moment comes. Without a successor you may have no chosen decision-maker at all.

That depends on the election you make and on applicable law. Immediate authority is easier for clinicians to act on; authority that begins only on a determination of incapacity gives you more control but can be harder to verify quickly.

Your own informed decisions remain central for as long as you can make and communicate them, subject to applicable law. This document is not permission to bypass you.

No. Continuing treatment, limiting it in stated circumstances, or leaving the decision to your agent are personal values choices. They are presented neutrally with no recommended answer, and nothing in the questionnaire nudges you toward one.

Many people view medically provided nutrition and hydration differently from other interventions. Asking separately prevents an assumption being drawn from your general treatment answer.

It allows an intervention for a defined period, followed by reassessment against stated recovery or comfort goals. It is a middle path between continuing indefinitely and declining altogether, and many forms omit it.

No. Pain and symptom management, hygiene, warmth, positioning, and emotional support continue regardless of what you elect about life-sustaining treatment.

Your elections cover situations you could foresee. Your agent will probably face one you did not. The values statement is what they read when no instruction fits, and it is the only place your reasoning is recorded rather than just your answers.

Some jurisdictions limit, suspend, or condition an advance directive while the person who signed it is pregnant, and the provisions differ substantially. The document surfaces the question and records your wishes rather than pretending the issue does not exist. Whether those wishes are given effect depends on local law.

Eligibility is usually more restricted than for other documents — the agent, treating clinicians, facility employees, and people who would inherit are commonly excluded. Rules vary, so confirm current requirements where you live before anyone signs.

Not automatically. Witness and acknowledgment requirements are separate, and satisfying one does not necessarily satisfy the other. Confirm both.

A directive the treating team cannot find may not guide your care at all. Give copies to your agent and successor, your physician, and the hospital likely to treat you, and carry a note saying one exists and where to find it.

That a directive exists, who your agent is and how to reach them, and where a copy can be found. Keep sensitive medical detail off it.

Use a method permitted where you live, then notify every agent, clinician, facility, and person holding a copy. Replacing the copy in your medical record matters most — an old version left on file is the one that gets followed.

No. Those are clinician-completed medical orders for specific circumstances. This is your document and does not replace them.

Not necessarily. Coordinate it with donor registries and identification records; the directive states your wish but is not the only record that matters.

Disputed capacity, family conflict, care across state lines, institutional restrictions, pregnancy-related instructions, psychiatric treatment, guardianship, unusual religious limits, or wording your clinician finds medically ambiguous. A form cannot resolve a live dispute.

No document can guarantee that. Locke Direct produces the document from your answers; recognition, execution, and clinical application remain your responsibility, which is why the delivery step and confirming local requirements matter.