JULY 14, 2014 VOLUME 21 NUMBER 25
Last week I underwent a small outpatient surgical procedure (I’m fine — thanks for asking). I actually looked forward to the “do you have an advance (medical) directive?” question on admission.
A couple years ago I had another outpatient procedure, and was surprised when the intake clerk asked about my advance directive. “Do I have one?” I asked, rhetorically and with amazement. “Of course I do. I am an elder law attorney practicing in Tucson for nearly four decades. I was involved in the leading Arizona case on surrogate decision-making. I sat on the legislative committee that came up with our current advance directive law, back in the 1990s. Not only do I have an advance directive, I have a darn good one!” “Great,” said the intake clerk — “where is it?” “In the safe at my office,” I admitted, sheepishly. Oops.
Since then the Arizona legislature has approved an online registry system for advance directives. If you are an Arizona resident, you can send a copy of your health care power of attorney and/or living will to the Arizona Secretary of State’s office, along with a form you can download, to get your directive(s) registered. (Actually, there’s nothing on the site that says you have to be an Arizona resident — but we simply don’t know how well it would work if you tried it from out of state.)
Once you fill out the form and send in your copy, you get a registration card back in the mail. It takes a couple weeks. My wife and I did this a few months ago, and so I was looking forward to using the form when I had to go in for last week’s procedure.
“Do you have an advance directive?” asked the intake clerk. “You bet,” I proudly replied, “and here’s how you can get a copy of it.” I handed her my card. “Huh.” she said (she was very expressive). I asked her if she had ever seen a card like that before, and she said that yes, she had started seeing them lately. Good news all around.
How does it work? Your registration card has a website address, a login and a password. Your doctor, hospital, outpatient surgical center, or anyone else with the login and password can download a PDF copy of your advance directive. And you can update the directive any time you sign a newer, better, more current one.
Here’s what mine looks like:
There’s a really nice change in recent years, and one disappointment. We can help you with the latter.
The good news: the current Arizona Secretary of State thinks your name is more important than his. His predecessor had her name splashed across the form and your identification card in type larger than the part that identified you — it was confusing and cheesy. Examining my current card, I can’t even find the Secretary of State’s name, and that despite the fact that the fellow is running for office. Good to see.
The bad news: the card you get back is a flimsy paper wallet-sized card. It isn’t laminated, isn’t durable, is easy to lose. Our offer: if we wrote your advance health care directive, we have a laminating machine that we’ll be happy to use to laminate your card. No cost. Just like the program itself.
Now you Arizona residents don’t have to keep a copy of your advance health care directives with you when you travel. You don’t need an extra copy stuffed into your car’s glove box. And, most importantly of all, you don’t have to sign a new document when you get to the intake clerk and she asks you where you keep your advance directive. It’s online, and in your wallet/purse.
Want more information? Check out the Secretary of State’s website or, within reason, ask us. If you are a client, we will do whatever it takes to get your card into your wallet. If you’re not a client, we’re still pretty nice, and we’ll probably help you.
You say you don’t have an advance directive? Shame. Get on that right away, please. It really is important.
4 Responses
That’s a terrific service from the government but until we’re sure if all states have this our office set up it’s own online secure portal for every client so they can access their documents. Do we know what the (privacy) law is (if any) about carrying such a card showing the location of these documents?
We provide a service like this, with additional ability to immediately provide important medical information as well as other important documents if needed such as medical health care power of attorney (especially beneficial for adult children over 18 who are still on your insurance policy and are involved in an emergency and can’t grant access to you themselves) and more. The legality of this is HIPAA compliant too because the individual themselves makes this information available when they use it (specific agreement to grant that at sign up) so it crosses State and international lines. We provide this service called SafelyMD to individuals and it is included in SafelyFiled for families. Elder Law Attorneys, Estate Planners and others like professional services can offer this to their clients with their own name on it. We’d love the opportunity to talk to you more about it. This came about out of a discussion at a NAELA conference in Atlanta last year. Check out more about it and us on our website: http://www.safelyfiled.com
Thanks so much for that information, Robert! And glad to know you are fine too.