In North Carolina an adult has a right to prepare an Advance Health Care Directive Declaration to control the health care treatment decisions that can be made on that person behalf
|
Legal Document Preparation Service |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Health Care Power of Attorney designating a patient advocate to make health care decisions for a principal. LHM provides North Carolina Health Care Directive, Living Will (Declaration of a Desire for a Natural Death) |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||
|
|||||||||
|
According to North Carolina law, an advance health care directive means a witnessed written document in which instructions are given by a principal or in which the principal's desires are expressed concerning any aspect of the principal's health care.
North Carolina State law allows for two different Advance Health Care Directives:
Legal Helpmate® provides you with two options 1) The Premium Package - North Carolina Advance Health Care Directive contains the following documents:
THIS ADVANCE HEALTH CARE DIRECTIVE IS NOT VALID UNLESS IT IS SIGNED IN THE PRESENCE OF TWO COMPETENT ADULT WITNESSES. THE FOLLOWING PERSONS MAY NOT ACT AS ONE OF THE WITNESSES: (1) the person designated by the Principal as your agent;(2) a person related to the Principal by blood or marriage; (3) a person entitled to any part of the Principal’s estate after the Principal’s death under a will or codicil executed by the Principal or by operation of law; (4) the Principal’s attending physician; (5) an employee of the Principal’s attending physician; (6) an employee of a health care facility in which the Principal is a patient if the employee is providing direct patient care to the Principal or is an officer, director, partner, or business office employee of the health care facility or of any parent organization of the health care facility; or (7) a person who, at the time this power of attorney is executed, has a claim against any part of the Principal’s estate after his or her death. LIVING WILL (DECLARATION of a DESIRE for a NATURAL DEATH) In North Carolina statutory Living Will is called a Declaration for a Desire for a Natural Death.According to North Carolina law every person has a right to a natural death and may execute a legal document governing the withholding or withdrawal of life sustaining treatment. If a person has declared a desire that his life not be prolonged by extraordinary means or by artificial nutrition or hydration, these extraordinary means could be withheld when two conditions are met: (1) It is determined by the attending physician that the declarant's present condition is: a. Terminal and incurable; or b. Diagnosed as a persistent vegetative state; and (2) There is confirmation of the declarant's present condition by a physician other than the attending physician. The attending physician may rely upon a signed, witnessed, dated and proved declaration, or a copy of that declaration obtained from the Advance Health Care Directive Registry maintained by the Secretary of State pursuant to Article 21 of Chapter 130A of the General Statutes; A Living Will Declaration expresses a desire of the declarant that extraordinary means or artificial nutrition or hydration not be used to prolong his life if his condition is determined to be terminal and incurable, or if the declarant is diagnosed as being in a persistent vegetative state; and states that the declarant is aware that the declaration authorizes a physician to withhold or discontinue the extraordinary means or artificial nutrition or hydration; A Declaration of a Desire for a Natural Death has to be signed by the declarant in the presence of two witnesses who believe the declarant to be of sound mind and who state that they:
No person shall be required to sign a declaration as a condition for becoming insured under any insurance contract or for receiving any medical treatment. The withholding or discontinuance of extraordinary means and/or the withholding or discontinuance of either artificial nutrition or hydration, or both in accordance with this section shall not be considered the cause of death for any civil or criminal purposes nor shall it be considered unprofessional conduct. Any person, institution or facility against whom criminal or civil liability is asserted because of conduct in compliance with this section may interpose this section as a defense. Any certificate in the form provided prior to July 1, 1979, shall continue to be valid. The determination that a person is dead shall be made by a physician licensed to practice medicine applying ordinary and accepted standards of medical practice. Brain death, defined as irreversible cessation of total brain function, may be used as a sole basis for the determination that a person has died, particularly when brain death occurs in the presence of artificially maintained respiratory and circulatory functions. This specific recognition of brain death as a criterion of death of the person shall not preclude the use of other medically recognized criteria for determining whether and when a person has died. Registration. You may register your Advance Health Care Directive with the Secretary of State, but you are not required by law to do so. HEALTH CARE POWER OF ATTORNEY (MEDICAL POWER OF ATTORNEY) You have the right to make decisions about your health care. No health care may be given to you over your objection, and necessary health care may not be stopped or withheld if you object.Because your health care providers in some cases may not have had the opportunity to establish a long-term relationship with you, they are often unfamiliar with your beliefs and values and the details of your family relationships. This poses a problem if you become physically or mentally unable to make decisions about your health care. In order to avoid this problem, you may sign this legal document to specify the person whom you want to make health care decisions for you if you are unable to make those decisions personally. The North Carolina General Assembly recognizes as a matter of public policy the fundamental right of an individual to control the decisions relating to his or her medical care, and that this right may be exercised on behalf of the individual by an agent chosen by the individual. You may appoint as your agent any competent person who is at least 18 years old and who is not providing paid health care to you. The person you appoint is called your health care agent. Your North Carolina Health Care Power of Attorney gives the person you designate your health care agent broad powers to make health care decisions, including mental health treatment decisions, for you. Except to the extent that you express specific limitations or restrictions on the authority of your health care agent, this power includes the power to consent to your doctor not giving treatment or stopping treatment necessary to keep you alive, admit you to a facility, and administer certain treatments and medications. This power exists only as to those health care decisions for which you are unable to give informed consent. You must sign your North Carolina Health Care Power of Attorney in the presence of two qualified witnesses, and it must be notarized. This form does not impose a duty on your health care agent to exercise granted powers, but when a power is granted, your health care agent will have to use due care to act in your best interests and in accordance with this North Carolina health care power of attorney. For mental health treatment decisions, your health care agent will act according to how the health care agent believes you would act if you were making the decision. Because the powers granted by this document are broad and sweeping, you should discuss your wishes concerning life-sustaining procedures, mental health treatment, and other health care decisions with your health care agent. You may name co-agents and successor agents under this North Carolina Health Care Power of Attorney, but you may not name a health care provider who may be directly or indirectly involved in rendering health care to you under this power. You may also use Power of Attorney for Health Care to authorize your attorney in fact to make an anatomical gift upon your death. If you wish to name a guardian of your person in the event a court decides that one should be appointed, you may, but are not required to, do so by providing the name of such guardian. You may, but are not required to, nominate as your guardian the same person named in this form as your agent. Do not sign this document unless you clearly understand it. It is suggested that you keep the original of your ower of Attorney for Health Care on file with your physician. If there is something you do not understand about these legal documents you should consult an attorney. Before signing this North Carolina Health Care Directive you need to discuss your treatment with your physician in as many details as possible, and consider types of treatments that you want/do not want to be performed for you when you are unable to express your wishes because of your illness. Please make sure to state clearly particular treatments you want or do not want. |
|||||||||
| * * * | |||||||||
|
|
|||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||