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Valor Tax Relief Team
Estate planning articles
Published: October 2, 2026
Last Updated: October 2, 2026
The Short Answer
A healthcare proxy is a person. If you cannot talk, that person makes medical decisions with the team. The National Institute on Aging also calls the role representative, surrogate, or agent. You name the proxy on a durable power of attorney for health care, or on a combined advance directive. A living will is the written list of treatments. You usually want the person and the list.
Valor’s living will service is the state hospital paper. On many statutes that paper also names the agent. We do not sell a separate healthcare-proxy SKU. What is a living will is the list. This page is the speaker.
What NIA Means
National Institute on Aging, in short
The proxy makes health-care decisions if you cannot communicate. The role is part of advance-care planning. You can choose a proxy in addition to or instead of a living will. The proxy can decide types of care, who provides it, and, in many states, organ donation and what happens to the body. The proxy acts only when you are too sick to decide.
NIA is the encyclopedia on this search. We are not trying to replace it. Living will vs advance directive is the umbrella. Living will vs power of attorney is the financial vs medical split. Do not hand the ICU a bank POA and call it a proxy.
Who Can Serve
Most states require an adult of sound mind. NIA notes Alabama and Nebraska use 19. Pick someone who will actually travel, can sit with doctors, and will follow what you said even if relatives argue. Name an alternate. Ask the person before you write the name.
Many statutes block your treating provider, the owner of your facility, and people paid to evaluate your capacity. State legal aid or the state form instructions list the rest. After you sign, give the proxy a copy, tell the clinic, and talk at least once a year. NIA says you can change the proxy by signing a new form.
Proxy vs Living Will vs DNR
Healthcare proxy
A person. Speaks when you cannot. Flexibility when the list runs out.
Living will
A list. CPR, machines, feeding tube, comfort care. Silent if a situation is not on the page.
DNR / POLST
Clinician orders for EMS. The proxy paper is not in the ambulance unless those orders exist too.
A financial durable POA is a fourth paper. What is a durable power of attorney is the checkbook. The proxy does not sell the house.
Ellis in the Hallway
Ellis tells his brother he “does not want machines.” He never names a proxy and never signs a living will. After a stroke, two sisters and a girlfriend each claim they know what he meant. The hospital has no speaker and no list. Staff default to aggressive care until a court names a guardian. A signed state form would not have ended every argument. It would have given the team a person and a starting list.
If the empty chart is yours, start with the living-will service for your state, not a last-will kit.
Give the proxy the clinic names, the medication list, and a copy of the living will. NIA says to keep talking at least once a year. A named speaker who has never heard your wishes is only slightly better than no speaker.
How Valor Helps
We prepare the living will, or the combined state directive that names the agent, for the state that applies to you. We do not host a national PDF. NIA remains the medical explainer. Our job is the signed state paper in the chart.
Fees are quoted before you hire.
Frequently Asked Questions
Need the Hospital Paper for Your State?
Request a living-will consult. We prepare the state form that names the speaker and, where the statute combines them, the treatment list. We do not mail a national PDF.
Request a consult