It is often a difficult situation when older loved ones no longer have the legal competence to make financial and health care decisions for themselves.  It may be even more troubling to find that while their spouse or partner is authorized to act as their agent by a valid power of attorney that the acting agent (who may also be older in years) may be viewed by third parties, such as a social worker or health care provider, as incapable of assisting the incompetent person and perhaps even obstructive in beneficially serving as the agent. The alleged “obstructive or inadequate” decision making by the agent may be a result of a lack of communication or understanding, a feeling of loss of independence and control and/or a result of mental decline in the named agent.  Other family members may not become aware of this situation until action has already been taken by a third party (often an attorney contacted by the social worker or health care provider) filing for appointment of guardianship of the incompetent person.  The applicant for guardianship will more likely than not be unknown to the incompetent person, the agent or any of the family.  This result will then require court appearance(s) time, money and create emotional distress to reach a reasonable solution.  A possible way to prevent this type of third party intervention is to make sure that successor agents who are younger than the person making the power of attorney (or their spouse or partner) have been named in powers of attorney for both financial and health care purposes.  The named successor agent can intervene to prevent a guardianship.

You do not need to navigate through these situations alone.  The attorneys at Thomas Law Group can assist in this planning to take care of your family in the future.