Your Benefits, Explained! Part 5: The Health Care Vault
You’re holding a hot-off-the-press newsletter, and you know what that means — it’s time for the next part of our series, “Your Benefits, Explained!” For the last four months, we’ve covered one of the 10 benefits of your Life Plan Membership in each issue. Today, we’re going to walk you through perhaps the most important benefit of all, which could actually save your life: the Health Care Vault! What is the Health Care Vault? The Health Care Vault is a secure online portal at MyHealthDocs.com where our team stores digital copies of your most important medical documents: your Advance Health Care Directive and HIPAA release (the document that authorizes medical professionals to share information with your list of approved people). It’s a private online space owned by Preston Estate Planning. This vault is vital for a few reasons. • First, you can access it quickly when you need copies of your paperwork — for example, when you’re at the doctor’s office or hospital about to undergo a procedure. This saves you time filling out the same forms twice, makes it easier to switch providers, and ensures you are using the copies you created with the input of your legal team here at Preston Estate Planning. • Second, your loved ones and medical professionals can access the vault in emergency situations, giving them the vital documents they need to make crucial health care decisions for you. This will ensure your wishes are carried out even if you’re unconscious or unable to communicate. How do I set up my Health Care Vault? We do it for you! When you become a Life Plan Member, we create your Advance Health Care Directive and HIPAA release. Then, we upload them to your Health Care Vault so they are waiting for you when you log in. How do I access it? After signing your Life Plan, you should have received an Emergency Medical Information Card to keep in your wallet or purse. That card is the key to unlocking your Health Care Vault! The Emergency Medical Information Card looks like a credit card, and you should keep it with you at all times. On the card, you’ll find your member ID and personal identification number (PIN). You can use that information to access MyHealthDocs.com. The card comes with a companion sticker that goes on your driver’s license to alert medical professionals to the fact that you have a card.
Anyone with your card, a photo of your card, or your member ID and PIN can access your Health Care Vault. We recommend sharing those details only with people you trust, like your spouse, a sibling, or your adult children. If you go into the doctor’s office or hospital for a procedure, you can hand your card over to them when they ask for a copy of one of the documents stored there, or they can find it in your purse or wallet during an emergency. When a medical provider logs in, they will have access only to your Advance Health Care Directive and HIPAA release. No other personal or financial information is stored on the site. How can it save my life? The Health Care Vault can be life-saving in two situations. During an emergency, it will give your doctors and loved ones access to the forms that hold your wishes, including if and/or how long you’d like to be on life support. Without these documents, your loved ones might make decisions contrary to your wishes. Worse, if you’re conscious in a medical emergency and you don’t have access to your Advance Health Care Directive, you may be asked to fill out a new one on the spot, which can be very dangerous, as explained below. In fact, the Vault is crucial even in a nonemergency situation. If you go in for a routine medical procedure without your Emergency Medical Card, the health care providers may ask you to fill out an Advanced Health Care Directive again. This new form will void the form you carefully filled out with your attorney, and you could easily make a life-altering mistake while filling it out, for example, by selecting something you don’t want with regards to life support. The medical providers could even ask you to fill out a Physician Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment (POLST) form. It’s very dangerous to fill this form out in a rush, because it has a “do not resuscitate” option, meaning if you check that box, you are opting out of CPR and similar life-saving treatments. By keeping your card with you and sharing documents in your vault, you can avoid the possibility of having to fill out these forms and doing so incorrectly. What should I do if I lose my card or if I never received one?
Call our office at 800-698-6918. We can cancel your old card, help you replace it, and update your login information within seven days.
2 PrestonEstatePlanning.com
Made with FlippingBook Ebook Creator