The Boston Globe recently ran a story (linked here) about the troubling process by which elderly individuals can be declared infirm and under the custody of a guardian in MA. Supposedly, this can occur without the senior citizen having a right to be present in the courtroom or to be represented by counsel; guardianships are also allegedly made permanent in two-minute hearings in MA probate courts. To make matters worse, courts don't insist on required minimal medical documentation, and approve guardianships without asking about the senior's long term prognosis for recovery and without determing whether an independent fact-finder must become involved. When a petition for guardianship is filed, the proposed ward is merely given a piece of paper, and may not be able to understand the petition or be able to appear in court to oppose it. This is especially problematic for "unbefriended elders" who don't have anyone to protect their interests, and hospitals or nursing homes are the parties who insist that these individuals are incapacitated. And according to estimates this happens to more than 2,000 people each year.
However, the problem does not end there. Once placed in the guardianship, senior citizens are deprived of needed services. Courts can't or won't track their whereabouts or monitor treatment. Moreover, guardians rarely file initial asset inventories or annual financial reports. Suffolk Probate Court recently examined five years of records and found that in one case a man was committed after a judge ruled that an elderly man was mentally ill "based on the six-word diagnosis - "Alcohol-related brain degeneration. Korsakoff's syndrome" - and an anecdote related by the hospital's lawyer about the man's loss of short-term memory." In 72% of the cases the medical certifications were unbelievably brief (a few sentences) or so vague that they fell far short of the requirement that the petitioner "describe in detail the diagnosis" requiring commitment. Significantly, corporations such as Partners Healthcare often own the hospitals that petition for guardianship and the nursing homes where these individuals are then committed. Finally, guardians are not licensed and do not have training requirements; many professional guardians are lawyers or social workers.and probate courts have no way of tracking how many wards a guardian has.
Hat tip: John Grohol at PsychCentral
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