Documents & Authority

Power of attorney, healthcare proxy, HIPAA authorization, representative payee: what each document actually lets one person do on behalf of another.

Documents & Authority August 18, 2026 Durable POA, Healthcare Proxy, Living Will: Who Decides What One is fourteen pages, notarized, and useless at the bedside. What each of the three documents actually authorizes, and the exact point where each one stops. 10 min read

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Admission packet, care-level reassessment letter, a survey report full of F-tags, a Medicare notice with a 48-hour deadline printed halfway down the second page — Yasmin Delacroix put all of it in one binder over the three years her father moved from his own house to assisted living and then to a nursing home. She is not a lawyer, a nurse, or a financial planner, and no page here says where anyone should live. What each guide does is quote the document itself, name the regulation or contract clause it comes from, and mark the date a deadline starts running.

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Every guide cites the agency, statute, or document it was checked against, and carries the date it was checked. Rules change — if something here is out of date, tell us and it gets corrected.