Designating a Health Care Surrogate in Florida – Barbara M. Pizzolato, P.A., Fort Myers, Florida.

Florida permits you, the principal, to designate another person, the surrogate, to make medical decisions on your behalf upon your incapacity provided you have executed a written advance directive, the Designation of Health Care Surrogate.

In the event that you do not designate a surrogate, a court may appoint a proxy to make the necessary decisions for you.

The “surrogate” is different from the “proxy”. A proxy is a competent adult who has not been chosen by you but who has been appointed and authorized by statute to make health care decisions for you. This is not necessarily someone you, the principal, would have chosen as the person who knows what you would want done.

You designate your surrogate by the execution of a “Designation of Health Care Surrogate” – a written document signed by you before two adult witnesses. The person designated as the surrogate may not act as a witness and at least one of the witnesses must not be your spouse nor your blood relative.

In addition, it is advisable to name an alternate surrogate in the designation instrument in case the primary surrogate is unable to act – failing to do so, however, will not invalidate the Designation. An exact copy of the Designation must be provided to the surrogate.

The surrogate is duty bound to consult as quickly as possible with the patient’s health care providers in order to make informed consent and may only make health care decisions for the principal (you) which the surrogate believes the principal would have made under the circumstances had the principal been capable of making decisions.

Seeking the surrogate’s consent to withhold or withdraw life-prolonging procedures is controlled by the Life-Prolonging Procedure Act of Florida, which will be addressed in the next article.

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