Have you recently been diagnosed with a serious illness or disease? An example could be a cancer diagnosis or the onset of a degenerative brain disease like Alzheimer’s.
You certainly may have many excellent treatment options and your prognosis may be good. But this is still an indicator that you should review your estate plan. Any time that there are major changes in your life, a review is necessary. Significant changes to your health certainly qualify and may need to be addressed.
Considering medical decisions
First and foremost, you want to think carefully about how medical decisions will be made for you. Do you have an advanced directive that gives instructions to your medical team? Did you use a medical power of attorney to choose an agent who can legally make medical decisions on your behalf? These are legal tools you can use, and they may need to be updated after a diagnosis – or they may need to be implemented if you haven’t used them yet.
Considering the cost
Another thing to think about is the cost of medical treatment. This can often be very high, so you need to make plans for long-term care costs. You may want to consider benefits eligibility. You certainly need to look at how spending your financial assets on this medical care is going to change how you allocate those assets in your estate plan.
These are just a few things to consider with estate planning. As you can see, it’s important to carefully look into all of the details and make updates at the proper times.