Don’t Head Back-to-College Without These 3 Documents
Preparing for College: Essential Legal Documents
Graduation season is upon us and even though you still may be celebrating the final days of high school, it’s never too early to start thinking about getting ready to head off to college. While your supply list will be long, there are a few additional things we would like to add: legal documents. Here are three documents we encourage you to get into place if you have (or will be) sending a child to college this year:
HIPAA Authorization Form
HIPAA (the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) is a federal law that controls access to an adult’s private health data. If your 18-year-old child has an accident or is hospitalized, the healthcare team cannot share their condition with you. A HIPAA authorization, signed by your adult child, allows you to ask for and receive information about their health status, progress, and treatment. “This is particularly important in the event your adult child is unconscious or incapacitated for a period of time,” suggests Ben Leonard for the National Law Review. “Without a HIPAA authorization in place, the only other way to obtain information regarding your child’s health would be to have a court appoint you as his or her guardian.”
Healthcare Power of Attorney
In addition to a signed HIPAA authorization, have a Healthcare Power of Attorney naming you as your child’s “medical agent.” If your child becomes unconscious or incapacitated, this document lets you view medical records and make decisions. Without it or or a court-appointed guardianship, healthcare decisions are solely in the hands of practitioners. “While this is not always a bad thing, a physician’s primary duty is to keep the patient alive,” says Leonard. “So, a provider might not pursue risky or experimental treatments due to liability concerns.”
General Durable Power of Attorney
The General Durable Power of Attorney authorizes you to make financial decisions on your child’s behalf should they not be able to do so on their own. This would allow you to manage bank accounts, pay bills, sign tax returns, apply for government benefits, break or apply for a lease, and conduct similar activities for your child’s financial and legal affairs.
Important Reminders for Parents
Leonard suggests some important things parents need to remember about all of these documents:
- Update these forms yearly. The institutions where you would most likely use these documents — like hospitals and banks — might refuse to honor them if they are outdated.
- These documents can be revoked at any time by your adult child, either orally or in writing. Your adult child retains control of the ongoing validity of these documents.
- For adult children attending college at an out-of-state university, parents will want to execute separate documents in both the student’s home state and college state. These “worst-case scenario” documents will probably never have to be used. But having them in place will give you great peace of mind while your child is away at school.
At Long Law Group, we believe in delivering a personalized level of service and care to our clients. We are happy to review your college legal documents or existing estate planning documents or help you create new ones. Please contact us at at contact@jlonglaw.com or 312-344-3644
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