A new federal study found that more than 5 million elderly Americans have a hard time remembering things and making daily decisions. This is in addition to the 3.4 million Americans who have alzheimer's or other types of dementia. The article appearing in The Week stated: "It now appears that more than one-third of the nation's elderly have some diminished mental function."
Why is this important to you and your family? First, this number is higher than experts originally believed. Second, the numbers will increase even more as baby boomers age.
Incapacity can be both emotionally and financially taxing if you don't properly plan for it. For example, if you don't have a comprehensive estate plan, you may be required to open and maintain a Guardianship and Conservatorship at the Probate Court to manage the incapacitated person's personal and financial matters. We call this a "living probate", which can be as time-consuming and expensive as the "death probate" which most people know about and try to avoid.
So, make sure that you and your loved ones have a comprehensive estate plan that deals with both death and incapacity: This includes a Durable Power of Attorney, Health Care Power of Attorney, HIPAA Authorization and Living Trust, among other documents needed to tie the main documents together.
