Since July 1, 2007, Georgia’s statutory living will and durable power of attorney for health care have been replaced by one document: the Georgia Advance Directive for Health Care. It has four parts and needs two witnesses but no notary. The moment you complete it, it replaces any earlier advance directive, durable power of attorney for health care, health care proxy or living will.
This page explains each part of the official Georgia form, quoting the version published by the Georgia Department of Human Services, Division of Aging Services, and gives you the form free in PDF and Word.
The short answer
The Georgia Advance Directive for Health Care is the statutory form under Chapter 32 of Title 31 of the Official Code of Georgia (O.C.G.A.). Any person of sound mind who is 18 or older, or an emancipated minor, can sign one. You sign it “in the presence of two witnesses”, who must be of sound mind and at least 18. In the form’s own words: “This form does not need to be notarized”. Using it is “completely optional”: other forms that substantially comply with it may be used in Georgia.
The four parts of the form
| Part | What it does | Required? |
|---|---|---|
| Part One: Health care agent | Names the person who makes health care decisions for you, plus up to two back-up agents. Replaces the old durable power of attorney for health care. | Optional |
| Part Two: Treatment preferences | Your choices about life support, tube feeding and fluids if you have a terminal condition or are permanently unconscious. Replaces the old living will. | Optional |
| Part Three: Guardianship | Nominates the person you would want a court to appoint as your guardian. | Optional |
| Part Four: Effectiveness and signatures | Your signature and two witnesses. “You must fill out PART FOUR of this form in order for this form to be effective.” | Always |
You may fill out “any or all of the first three parts”. Part One works even if Part Two is blank, and Part Two works even if Part One is blank.
Part One: choosing your health care agent
Your agent makes health care decisions “when I am unable to communicate my health care decisions or I choose to have my health care agent communicate my health care decisions.” So the form lets you hand decisions to your agent while you are still able to decide, if you choose to.
The form gives your agent “the same authority to make any health care decision that I could make”, including:
- admission to or discharge from any hospital, skilled nursing facility, hospice or other facility;
- requesting, consenting to, withholding or withdrawing any type of health care;
- contracting for care and obligating you to pay for it, without being personally liable;
- acting as your personal representative for medical privacy law, including the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), with the same access to your medical records that you have;
- riding with you in an ambulance and visiting you, where protocol permits.
What your agent can never decide. The form states that your agent “does not have the power to make health care decisions for me regarding psychosurgery, sterilization, or treatment or involuntary hospitalization for mental or emotional illness, developmental disability, or addictive disease.”
Who cannot be your agent
“A physician or health care provider who is directly involved in your health care may not serve as your health care agent.” Your agent also “has no duty to act, even if named”, and “a court can take away the powers of my health care agent if it finds that my health care agent is not acting properly.”
Marriage and divorce change your choice
The form warns: “If you are married, a future divorce or annulment of your marriage will revoke the selection of your current spouse as your health care agent. If you are not married, a future marriage will revoke the selection of your health care agent unless the person you selected as your health care agent is your new spouse.” If you marry after signing, review the form.
How your agent should decide
Your agent should think about “past conversations we have had, my treatment preferences as expressed in PART TWO”, your “religious and other beliefs and values” and how you have handled medical issues in the past. If that is still unclear, your agent decides in your best interest, “considering the benefits, burdens, and risks”.
After your death
Unless you initial a limit, your agent can authorize an autopsy, make a disposition of your body for medical purposes under the Georgia Revised Uniform Anatomical Gift Act, and decide on the final disposition of your body. You can initial to block any of these, name a different person for the final disposition, and choose burial or cremation.
Part Two: your treatment preferences
Part Two applies only if you are in a condition you initialed and you “can no longer communicate” your preferences “after reasonable and appropriate efforts have been made to communicate with me”. The two conditions are:
| Condition | Definition on the form |
|---|---|
| Terminal condition | An “incurable or irreversible condition that will result in my death in a relatively short period of time.” |
| State of permanent unconsciousness | An “incurable or irreversible condition in which I am not aware of myself or my environment and I show no behavioral response to my environment.” |
Your condition “will be determined in writing after personal examination by my attending physician and a second physician in accordance with currently accepted medical standards.”
Then you initial one of three choices:
- (A) Extend life. “Try to extend my life for as long as possible”, including nutrition or fluids by tube if you cannot take them by mouth.
- (B) Natural death. “Allow my natural death to occur.” No life-prolonging procedures and no tube nutrition or fluids “except as needed to provide pain medication”.
- (C) Natural death, with exceptions. You initial which you still want: nutrition by tube, fluids by tube, a ventilator, or CPR.
Whatever you choose, “You will be provided with comfort care, including pain relief”. Section (8) leaves space for additional statements, for example about antibiotics, surgery, dialysis or pain relief.
Pregnancy. The form explains that “under Georgia law, PART TWO generally will have no force and effect if I am pregnant unless the fetus is not viable and I indicate by initialing below that I want PART TWO to be carried out.”
If you named an agent in Part One, your agent “will have the authority to make all health care decisions for you regarding matters covered by PART TWO”, guided by your preferences.
Part Three: nominating a guardian
A court appoints a guardian only if it finds you are “not able to make significant responsible decisions” about your personal support, safety or welfare. You can nominate your agent from Part One (option A) or someone else (option B). The court appoints your nominee if that “will serve your best interest and welfare”. If your agent and guardian are different people, your agent “will have priority over your guardian in making your health care decisions, unless a court determines otherwise.”
How to sign a Georgia advance directive: witness rules
The directive becomes effective “only if I am unable or choose not to make or communicate my own health care decisions”, and lasts until your death unless you set other dates. You must sign and date it, “or acknowledge signing and dating this form in the presence of two witnesses.” Someone else may sign for you “in your presence and at your express direction.”
The witnesses “do not have to be together or present with you when you sign this form”, as long as you acknowledge your signature to them.
But each witness must sign in front of you. The Division of Aging Services instructions say: “the declarant must see both witnesses sign”. A witness who signs later, somewhere you are not, does not meet that rule.
Each witness must be of sound mind and at least 18. A witness:
- cannot be your health care agent or back-up agent;
- cannot be a person who will “knowingly inherit anything from you or otherwise knowingly gain a financial benefit from your death”;
- cannot be directly involved in your health care.
Only one witness may be an employee, agent or medical staff member of the facility where you are receiving care, and that witness cannot be directly involved in your care. No notary is needed, and “a copy of a validly executed advance directive for health care carries the same meaning and effect as the original document.”
What signing it does to older documents
Part Four says: “Completing this form revokes and replaces any advance directive for health care, durable power of attorney for health care, health care proxy, or living will that I have completed before this date.” If you do nothing, the state’s instructions say a valid living will signed between March 28, 1986 and June 30, 2007 will “remain valid until revoked”, and so will a valid durable power of attorney for health care signed before June 30, 2007.
Revoking it
According to the Division of Aging Services instructions, you can revoke the directive “at any time, regardless of the declarant’s mental state or competency”:
- by completing a new advance directive for health care;
- by burning, tearing up or otherwise destroying it;
- by writing a clear statement of your intent to revoke;
- by saying so in front of a witness aged 18 or older “who confirms this in writing within 30 days”. This revocation takes effect when your treating physician records it in your medical record.
It “remains effective even if a Guardian is appointed for the declarant unless a court specifically orders otherwise.”
If a doctor or hospital will not follow it
The state’s instructions summarize the law this way. For a health care decision a provider is unwilling to follow, “the agent is responsible for arranging for the declarant’s transfer to another health care provider” (O.C.G.A. section 31-32-8). For a decision to withhold or withdraw life-sustaining procedures, nourishment or hydration, attending physicians who refuse must make “a good faith attempt” to transfer you to a physician who will comply, or let your agent, next of kin or guardian find one (section 31-32-9). The instructions also note that the law “does not expressly state” who must arrange a transfer when it is the facility that refuses.
Common mistakes
- Skipping Part Four. Without it, nothing else on the form takes effect.
- Using your agent as a witness, or a relative who will knowingly inherit from you.
- Collecting a witness signature when you are not there. You must see both witnesses sign.
- Naming your own doctor as agent. A provider directly involved in your care cannot serve.
- Initialing more than one of options (A), (B) and (C) in Part Two.
- Forgetting the form after a marriage or divorce, which can revoke your choice of agent.
- Signing a new form without realizing it revokes older ones, including a health care proxy you signed earlier, in Georgia or elsewhere.
Free Georgia advance directive for health care form
Download the form in PDF or Word. It reproduces the four parts of the Georgia Advance Directive for Health Care as published by the Division of Aging Services (revised March 2016), with every initial line, the witness rules and the declarant and witness signature blocks.
After signing, the form’s instructions recommend giving copies “to people who might need it, such as your health care agent, your family, and your physician”, keeping a copy at home “in a place where it can easily be found”, and reviewing it periodically.
Georgia advance directive: common questions
Does a Georgia advance directive need to be notarized?
No. The form states: “This form does not need to be notarized”. It needs two qualified witnesses, and you must see both of them sign.
Is an advance directive from another state valid in Georgia?
The state’s instructions say other forms “that substantially comply with this form may be used in Georgia. This includes using forms from other states.”
Is a Georgia living will still valid?
A valid living will signed between March 28, 1986 and June 30, 2007 remains valid until revoked, according to the state’s instructions. Signing the new advance directive revokes and replaces it.
Can a family member witness a Georgia advance directive?
Not one who will knowingly inherit from you or benefit financially from your death, and not your agent or back-up agent. A relative who is none of those is not excluded by the form.
Does the advance directive cover financial decisions?
No. It covers health care, and certain decisions after death. Money and property need a separate financial power of attorney; see our durable power of attorney guide.
Do I have to use the state form?
No. “Using this form of advance directive for health care is completely optional. Other forms of advance directives for health care that substantially comply with this form may be used in Georgia. This includes using forms from other states.”
Related
- Medical power of attorney template for other states
- Living will template
- Georgia bill of sale
- Texas medical power of attorney, for comparison
How this page was checked
Every quotation comes from the Georgia Advance Directive for Health Care form and instructions published by the Georgia Department of Human Services, Division of Aging Services (revised March 2016), which reproduce the statutory form under O.C.G.A. Chapter 31-32 and summarize sections 31-32-8 and 31-32-9. We compared it with the July 2007 version. The downloadable form was compared part by part against the 2016 version.
Last verified: October 2026. We do not advance this date without re-checking the sources. The Georgia General Assembly can amend Chapter 31-32: check the current law and the Division of Aging Services (1-866-552-4464) before you sign.
LegalTemplateVault is not a law firm and does not provide legal advice. Compiled and edited by Daniel Mercer, editor of LegalTemplateVault. He is not an attorney, and neither is anyone else on this site: we compile primary sources and cite them so you can check them yourself.