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If you are looking to plan your estate, there are a number of legal and financial tools available to you to firmly document your wishes. Included in these tools are wills, gifting, alternative means of owning property (trusts, joint tenancy, and so forth), powers of appointment, and designating certain beneficiaries. Also, you can use powers of attorney, particularly durable financial power of attorney and durable medical power of attorney, or a living will.
A living will is a legal instrument which establishes, in advance, what you would like to have happen in the event you are on artificial life support and unable to communicate. Sometimes called an advance health directive, it is through a living will that you can establish your desires now in the unfortunate case your family has to know whether or not and for how long you would like to be kept alive by enteric feeding (also called "tube feeding"), or other artificial life sustaining methods.
A living will is a document which outlines very specific medical instructions concerning artificial life support. When an individual is in a coma or a vegetative state, he or she is no longer able to communicate desires for medical care. Today's effective life support systems can keep people alive for years, even if their brain no longer functions or they are in constant pain. A Montana living will lets you decide now, as a competent adult, what you would like to happen if you find yourself in that situation.
A LegalZoom living will includes provisions to designate a health care agent; granting another person power of attorney. Check out LegalZoom's free, online legal library for more information about health care agents.
LegalZoom can help you take control of your vital health care decisions quickly and easily. Simply fill out our free, online questionnaire and get your own, customized Montana living will in three easy steps.
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