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Is an advance directive enough to ensure that your wishes are followed when you cannot express them because of disease or illness that affects your ability to make decisions for yourself? Physician Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment (POLST Orders) for short, are often confused with advance directives. These medical care planning…
Many people understand that they should create an estate plan, but there are many reasons why they hesitate to do so. One of the most common reasons is that it can be difficult to accept that a person will not be around one day. If you die without an…
Many people who have engaged in estate planning understand that beneficiary designations play an invaluable. Despite this, the value of beneficiary designations is overlooked by some people. After signing estate planning documents, it is critical to make sure that your beneficiary designations are consistent with the rest of your estate…
Earlier this month the Center for Medicare Advocacy and the Long Term Care Community Coalition made a joint announcement regarding changes to the Nursing Home Compare website. Nursing Home Compare is a service provided by Medicare.gov to help prospective nursing home residents or nursing home residents and their families obtain…
Parents can make medical decisions for their children. After a child reaches the age of 18, however, and is viewed in the eyes of the law as an adult and a parent’s ability to make these decisions ends. Fortunately, through the use of a few simple estate planning documents,…
Trust protectors are becoming an increasingly common part of estate plans in New York as well as the rest of the country. A trust protector refers to someone who is appointed to look over a trust and make sure that the trust is not adversely affected by changes in the…
Many of you may recall when President John F. Kennedy founded the Peace Corps in 1961 and may have even signed up as a volunteer to help provide social and economic development assistance abroad. Borrowing on this model, an initiative is underway to establish an internal national volunteer care corps…
The Supreme Court of Montana recently affirmed a judgment by the district court distributing assets from a trust established by a husband and wife to the couple’s three children. The district court had interpreted the trust creator’s handwritten codicil as a wish and not a specific bequest of the…
The Mississippi Court of Appeals recently decided that a man convicted of DUI manslaughter that led to the death of his wife can collect survivor benefits from the state. The late woman had designated her husband as a 40% beneficiary while the deceased woman’s sister was a 60% beneficiary. While…
More seniors than ever are carrying high debt into retirement. Managing high debt simultaneously with managing the cost of daily living and medical care on a fixed income is a recurring problem in many households. The amount of debt burden has skyrocketed over the past decade. The National Council…