My husband is FPOA and trustee for his mother, who lives in another state, and handles all finances. Since his sister lives near their mother, she was named as HCPOA with agreement of all family several years ago. Recently, SIL has taken on more of a role in managing MIL's care, which should be minimal since MIL lives in a CBRF/AL; changing doctors, refusing certain medications, in opposition to MIL's requests. We suspect the psych evaluation was requested to settle the question of competency in face of differing decisions by SIL and MIL. We have asked to see the psych eval report, but SIL refuses, claiming HIPAA rules (although my husband is named later on the HCPOA). MIL has not been diagnosed with Alzheimer or other dementia, she is just cranky and outspoken, and makes crazy comments, and inattentive if she doesn't like the subject of discussion. But she also has a lot of physical ailments that required the ALF.
It appears to other family members that SIL is enjoying being in charge, and is doing all this for her own reasons. Now her claims have put her own sensibility in question, and her demands (like whether other family and friends can visit) are causing dissension.
Any advice?
But thanks again for listening.
If your mother has been declared incompetent and hubby is her financial POA, then he has the need to know. This is especially true if he has the springing type of POA that goes into effect when a person is incapacitated. Do you know which type POA he has? You can check the form and it will tell you when it becomes active. (Often they are active from the time they are signed, but other times they become active when the person is incapacitated.) If it is a springing type, maybe your hubby can request a copy of the statement of incompetence to put in his files.
I do hope you will be able to work through this as a family. Being a caregiver is not fun, so I doubt your SIL is trying to bogart the power. She may just be trying to avoid any arguments. Of course, I don't know your family. I am just speaking about some common problems that families have.
You say mom is complaining but also that she has dementia. Our mom complains too, but we take all that with a grain of salt. The HCPOA sounds stressed, afraid to share things with you. So you dispatch her brother to talk to her. You stay home. That's right, you are an in-law and sometimes there are times when you have to bite your lip and let THEM sort it out. It's not easy.
SIL does have some responsibilities to keep MIL's health history confidential. In many families the parties involved would ignore that and discuss the situation with the entire family if that seemed in the patient's best interest. But that does not make the disregard of confidentiality mandatory. Before this recent evaluation, has your mother signed HIPAA waivers to allow her doctors to talk to you?
Sometimes family caregiving is needed to supplement what is provided in AL, especially when needs have increased and the resident is now borderline for the level of care contracted for. If a new doctor is needed or the resident needs to see a new specialist, the AL staff will not typically handle those decisions.
Your SIL is legally responsible for making medical decisions for her mother. It is impossible to tell from what you have written whether SIL is "enjoying being in charge" and is "doing all this for her own reasons" or whether she is acting in her mother's best interest as far as she can see it.
If it is true that a professional evaluation found MIL "incompetent" to make her own decisions, and you think mother is just cranky and has physical ailments, then I wonder if some strong denial is going on, or if perhaps you and your husband are not in frequent touch with MIL.
The only way to change who is taking care of MIL's health would be to file for guardianship. Would that be in MIL's best interest, do you think? (Be aware that if family members disagree over who should be guardian that a judge can appoint an outsider to provide the service for a fee.)