An Advance Care Directive empowers you to make clear legal arrangements for your future health care, end of life wishes, preferred living arrangements and other personal matters. It replaces Enduring Powers of Guardianship, Medical Powers of Attorney and Anticipatory Directions with a single Advance Care Directive Form.
An Advance Care Directive allows a person to:
Given the importance of an Advance Care Directive it is highly advisable to seek out experienced and professional advice.
A Scammell & Co Wills and Estate Planning solicitor can assist you with the preparation of your Advance Care Directive – including the precise wording to adopt to give effect to your wishes, and in the signing process by acting as an authorised witness.
Scammell & Co offers competitive fixed-fees for standard Wills, Powers of Attorney and Advance Care Directives with discounts offered on combinations of these. Discounts are also offered to Seniors Card and Concession Card holders.
Scammell & Co have offices located in Adelaide, Walkerville, Port Adelaide, and Gawler. Call or email us today to speak with an experienced member of our Wills and Estate Planning team about your needs, or to book an appointment at an office convenient to you.
Disclaimer: Due to our competitive fixed-fee pricing structure for Wills, Powers of Attorney and Advance Care Directives, the FREE 30 minute offer for initial appointments does not apply.
An Advance Care Directive form is a legally binding document that expresses a person’s wishes and / or directions in the event that decision making is impaired or lost in the future. Only people over 18 years of age can make an Advance Care Directive.
For an Advance Care Directive form to be legally valid it must be in the correct form and the person making it must have the mental capacity to understand its nature and effect and the consequences of completing and signing the document. This must be done without any coercion, pressure, or influence by others.
Making an Advance Care Directive is a way of planning ahead and ensuring that your wishes are followed and that someone, who you know and trust, can legally look after your day-to-day care needs and lifestyle choices, if you are unable to do so.
If you have impaired decision making capacity and do not have an Advance Care Directive form then the SACAT Tribunal will decide who can make your medical, personal and social decisions as well as decide where you live.
This may not be the person or persons who you would want to make the decisions for you. (This only applies if there is no Power of Attorney or Advance Care Directive).
An Advance Care Directive form allows a person to:
As soon as it is signed by you and witnessed by an authorised person BUT can only be used by a substitute decision maker or health practitioner if the person who gave the Advance Care Directive has impaired decision making capacity.
An Advance Care Directive empowers you to make clear legal arrangements for your future health care, end of life, preferred living arrangements and other personal matters. It replaces Enduring Powers of Guardianship, Medical Powers of Attorney and Anticipatory Directions with a single Advance Care Directive Form.
An Advance Care Directive allows you to:
A Substitute Decision-Maker is an adult you choose and appoint in your Advance Care Directive to make decisions about your future health care, end of life, living arrangements and other personal matters when you are unable to make these decisions for yourself, whether for a short time only or permanently. The Substitute Decision-Maker(s) must sign the Form and accept their role.
At some point in your life, there may come a time when you may be unable to make your own decisions. It could be because:
If this happened, how would you want decisions to be made for you about your health care, living arrangements and other personal matters? More importantly, who would you want making these decisions for you? An Advance Care Directive makes it easy for others to know what your wishes are when you are unable to make these decisions yourself. It also gives you peace of mind to know that your wishes will be known and can be respected, if others need to make decisions for you.
An Advance Care Directive is not a Will. It also cannot be used to make financial or legal decisions. It is recommended you think about putting in place an Enduring Power of Attorney to make decisions about your future finances and legal matters.
Your Advance Care Directive only takes effect (can only be used) when you are unable to make your own decisions. You can make your own decision if you can:
If, in the future you are unable to do these four things, it means you are unable to make the decision and someone else will need to make the decision for you.
If you already have a valid Enduring Power of Guardianship, a Medical Power of Attorney or an Anticipatory Direction and they still conform with your wishes, these are still legally effective unless you complete an Advance Care Directive Form.
You can put an Advance Care Directive in place at any stage of life – whether you are a young adult, middle aged or a senior person, and whether you are perfectly healthy or unwell.
To have an Advance Care Directive:
You are able to make binding refusals of certain health care in your Advance Care Directive. This includes refusals of life sustaining measures should you ever be in a persistent vegetative state or in the terminal phase of a terminal illness.
Certain people may still make decisions in relation to your health care if you lose the ability to do so yourself, but may argue over who makes decisions for you if they do not know your wishes. This might not necessarily include family members. An Advance Care Directive formally records your wishes and allows you to avoid arguments amongst your family members as to who has priority to make decisions on your behalf.
