When it comes to long-term care planning, particularly if you have elderly parents or are an older person yourself, there are a number of considerations to be had. Your first thought might be to do a traditional will, which is great to have on file should something happen to you. But a living will is equally important for a variety of reasons. Whether you live in Arizona and have an Arizona living will or live elsewhere and haven’t yet thought about this document, the time is now to start planning since you never know what will happen to you.

A living will is important because it provides a blueprint for how you want decisions to be made on your behalf should you no longer be able to make them for yourself. Additionally, an Arizona living will gives those that will help care for you an idea of what you expect in terms of care and how you would like for that care to be administered for the rest of your life, following a health incident.

In other words, an Arizona living will provides specific directives for how you want your medical care handled and by who, and what long-term care plans you have for yourself should you have to make some choices. If you have older parents, this document can be an invaluable resource that allows you to intermingle their plans with yours. In other words, if your parents name you as their health care advocate in their living will, then you have time to plan for that role. Talk to them about how they want their medical decisions handled and what their wishes would be should they become completely incapacitated.

Talk about things like nursing homes, living with you and going into an assisted living facility and once they come to a decision about how they want things handled, encourage your parents to include this information in their living will document. This saves you the heartache of trying to decide for them down the road, particularly if you are not ready to take on the role of a caregiver. Talk about the financial issues regarding long term care and again, ask your elderly parents to include their wishes in this regard in their living will document. This ensures that you don’t have to guess what they might have wanted and you know that every move you make is what they would have wanted, no matter what the situation.

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If you are not sure as to what legal document you currently have contact one of our professionals to help you with your estate planning. They will make sure you have all of your grounds covered and have the right legal documents that best suite your wants and needs.

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