When should I make a Health and Welfare Lasting Power of Attorney?

• Posted onJanuary 15, 2025

Vicky Broderick from WSP Solicitors’ Private Client Department, explains the importance of creating a Health and Welfare Lasting Power of Attorney (LPA) and when best to create one.

Vicky outlines how this legal document allows you to appoint trusted individuals to make important decisions on your behalf regarding your medical care, living arrangements, and end-of-life choices, should you lose the mental capacity to make those decisions yourself. Vicky also highlights why now is the best time to create an LPA and the peace of mind it can provide for you and your loved ones.

What is a health and welfare lasting power of attorney (LPA)?

By creating a Health and Welfare Lasting Power of Attorney (LPA) while you retain your faculties, also known as mental capacity, you may carefully choose the people you trust the most to make vitally important decisions in the future on your behalf in relation to your medical care, where you live, and ultimately end-of-life decisions.

Why creating a health and welfare LPA is important 

Once a Health and Welfare LPA has been created and registered with the Office of the Public Guardian, it can be kept in a safe place where it lies dormant until it is needed. While you remain able to make decisions yourself, the Health and Welfare LPA cannot be used by your attorneys. However, if the day comes when you have lost this ability, your attorneys have the power to step in and make decisions on your behalf. They are bound by law to act as if they were you, meaning that the decisions they make are only ever in your best interests.

How a health and welfare LPA provides peace of mind

When you appoint your attorneys, you can communicate to them your wishes regarding your preferred manner of healthcare, your dietary preferences, and your wishes regarding end-of-life care.

The role of attorneys in health and welfare decisions

Health professionals and care home managers are increasingly requiring family members to produce Health and Welfare LPAs rather than relying on “next of kin.” Without a Health and Welfare LPA in place, the power to make medical and care decisions lies with doctors and social workers, rather than with the people who know you best and who you trust the most.

Why health and welfare LPAs are increasingly essential in healthcare

So, when is the best time to create a Health and Welfare LPA, I hear you ask? Well, in a nutshell, now, as there is no point in putting this off until tomorrow. In the words of the old cliché, tomorrow never comes! Having peace of mind that you have an LPA in place, appointing those persons who you know will have your best interests at heart no matter the circumstance, is invaluable.