Idaho Advance Directive Guide

An Idaho advance directive is one document: the advance care planning document, or ACPD, created by Idaho Code 39-4510. Any competent person aged 18 or older may sign one. It is valid if it carries your name, date of birth, telephone number and mailing address, your signature, and the date. Idaho requires no witness and no notary, and Settled Estate read every rule on this page against the live Idaho Code on September 24, 2026.

Use this page as a map of the statute, then have an Idaho attorney review anything you plan to sign. It is not legal advice.

Idaho Replaced Two Documents With One in 2023

Before July 1, 2023, Idaho used a living will and a separate durable power of attorney for health care, each under the old section 39-4510. House Bill 223, enacted as 2023 Idaho Session Laws chapter 307 and effective July 1, 2023, repealed that section and wrote a new one around a single advance care planning document.

Much of what you will find online still describes the old two-document scheme, with its fixed statutory form and its signing ceremony. That advice is out of date. Here is how the current law works.

The act that governs the document is The Medical Consent and Natural Death Act, Idaho Code Title 39, Chapter 45, sections 39-4501 through 39-4517. Section 39-4502(1) treats "advance care planning document", "advance directive", "directive" and "health care directive" as one defined term. That definition covers three things:

a document that meets the 39-4510(1) requirements in substance,
a POST form, or
any other document that represents a competent person's authentic expression of health care wishes.

What an Idaho ACPD Must Contain

Section 39-4510(1) states the whole execution rule. To count as a valid ACPD, a document must include:

Required element	Statute
Your name, date of birth, telephone number and mailing address	39-4510(1)(a)
Your signature, or the signature of your authorized agent	39-4510(1)(b)
The date you signed	39-4510(1)(c)

That is the full list. Section 39-4510(1) also says any part of the document you leave blank "shall be deemed intentional and shall not invalidate the document." A form with the resuscitation section left empty is still a valid ACPD. The blank simply means you chose not to give that instruction.

What an Idaho ACPD May Contain

Section 39-4510(2) lists content an ACPD "may but is not required to include":

Optional content	Statute
Your email address	39-4510(2)(a)
Nomination of one or more health care agents	39-4510(2)(b)
Each agent's name, mailing address, email, telephone number and relationship to you	39-4510(2)(c)
Resuscitation instructions	39-4510(2)(d)
Instructions regarding pregnancy	39-4510(2)(e)
Instructions for releasing information protected by HIPAA	39-4510(2)(g)
Instructions for end-of-life care	39-4510(2)(h)
A description of treatment objectives	39-4510(2)(i)
The names and contact information of witnesses	39-4510(2)(j)
Notarization	39-4510(2)(k)

The list jumps from (e) to (g). There is no paragraph (f) on the live code page or in the enacted bill, so do not go looking for a missing requirement.

Witnesses and a notary sit on the optional list. Neither is a condition of validity. Some people add one anyway, since a notarized or witnessed signature can make a document easier to accept for a provider outside Idaho, but Idaho law does not ask for it.

The State's Optional Form

Section 39-4510(1) lets the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare publish an optional ACPD form and says the form "is not mandatory." The department publishes one on its Advance Directives and Registry Services page.

Three things to know about it:

It keeps the old names. The form is titled "Idaho Durable Power of Attorney for Healthcare and Living Will" (Version 2.2, updated March 2025). Both parts sit in one signed document, which is what 39-4510 now describes.
It has no witness or notary block. The department's page says an Idaho advance directive "must be signed by you and does not need to be notarized or signed by a medical provider."
You do not have to use it. Any document with the three required elements qualifies. A lawyer-drafted directive, or one from another source, works as long as 39-4510(1) is met.

The department also offers a planning worksheet and a notice about the pregnancy section on the same page.

When Your Health Care Agent Can Act

Your ACPD takes effect on the date you sign it and lasts until you revoke or replace it, under Idaho Code 39-4512. You may sign a new one at any time.

Your agent's authority turns on capacity. Under Idaho Code 39-4503, a person who understands the need for the proposed care, its nature, and the risks that ordinarily come with it can consent for himself or herself. When you cannot, Idaho Code 39-4504(1)(b) lets the agent named in your ACPD decide, provided the conditions your document sets for the agent to act have been satisfied.

Idaho does not wait for a terminal diagnosis. The trigger is your inability to consent, plus any condition you write into the document yourself. If you want your agent to act only after two doctors agree you lack capacity, say so in the ACPD.

Two limits apply to every surrogate, agents included:

The surrogate must understand enough to consent to his or her own care under 39-4503.
The surrogate has no authority to consent to or refuse care contrary to your ACPD or to wishes you expressed while you were capable.

Chapter 45 sets no rule for how two co-agents share authority or which of several named agents goes first. If you name more than one, write the order into the document.

If You Never Name an Agent

Section 39-4504(1) gives a priority list. Consent for an adult who cannot consent may be given or refused by the first available person in this order:

A court-appointed guardian.
The health care agent named in your ACPD, once its conditions are met.
Your spouse.
An adult child.
A parent.
A person named in a delegation of parental authority.
Any relative.
Any other competent individual who represents himself or herself as responsible for your health care.
In a medical emergency, when you have not communicated and cannot communicate your wishes, the attending provider, in his or her discretion.

Notice the first rung. A court-appointed guardian outranks the agent you picked. Signing an ACPD is the simplest way to keep a guardianship case from being needed in the first place, which Idaho guardianship planning covers in more depth.

Section 39-4504 has no tie-breaker for members of the same class, such as three adult children who disagree. Nothing else in chapter 45 supplies one. Naming one agent in writing avoids that gap.

Revoking or Suspending Your ACPD

Idaho Code 39-4511A(1) lets you revoke your ACPD at any time by any of these methods:

canceling, defacing, obliterating, burning, tearing or otherwise destroying it, yourself or through someone acting in your presence and at your direction,
a written, signed revocation,
an oral statement of your intent to revoke, or
any other action that clearly shows your intent to revoke.

The burden of telling people is yours. Section 39-4511A(2) makes you responsible for notifying your health care providers, and a provider without actual knowledge of the revocation may rely on the document as if you had never revoked it.

Idaho also allows a pause. Under Idaho Code 39-4511B you can suspend your ACPD by a signed writing, an oral statement, or any act that clearly shows the intent. When the suspension's terms end, the document's instructions resume.

The POST Form: Idaho's Portable Medical Order

An ACPD states your wishes. A Physician Orders for Scope of Treatment form, or POST, turns them into a medical order. Under Idaho Code 39-4512A, a POST is signed by a licensed independent practitioner (a physician, physician assistant or advanced practice registered nurse) and by you or your surrogate. It may not contradict your last known expressed wishes.

The POST carries weight the ACPD does not:

It counts as a DNR order. Under Idaho Code 39-4512B(2), a valid POST form meets the requirements of a Do Not Resuscitate order at all Idaho health care facilities, and providers may not require other forms.
It travels with you. Section 39-4514(9)(a) makes it effective in every care setting, including home care, ambulance transport, hospital, residential care and hospice. A photocopy, fax or electronic copy may be treated as the original.
You can wear it. A person whose POST says Do Not Resuscitate may wear a POST identification device on the wrist, neck or ankle under 39-4512A(4).

The department's page says a copy of the POST form is available by emailing [email protected]. Your practitioner must, on request, give you a copy, discuss it and help you fill it out (39-4512A(3)).

Without a POST or a DNR order, Idaho presumes consent to CPR. Idaho Code 39-4514(5) overrides the presumption only when CPR is contrary to your ACPD, your surrogate has communicated your wish not to receive it, you wear a proper POST identification device, or a practitioner has signed a DNR order.

Feeding, Hydration and Comfort Care

Section 39-4514(3) sets a rule worth reading before you write treatment instructions. Assisted feeding and artificial nutrition and hydration may not be withdrawn or denied if you, your ACPD, or your surrogate direct that they be provided. Other life-sustaining or comfort care directed to be provided may not be withdrawn unless it would be nonbeneficial medical treatment. Care that your valid ACPD directs to be withheld must be withdrawn and denied as the document says.

Whenever life-sustaining treatment or artificial nutrition is withheld or withdrawn, 39-4514(4) requires comfort care. Section 39-4514(2) states that the chapter does not make legal, and in no way condones, euthanasia, mercy killing or assisted suicide.

The Idaho Healthcare Directive Registry

Idaho Code 39-4515 requires the Department of Health and Welfare to run a web-based registry available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It absorbed the documents people once filed with the Idaho Secretary of State.

Registry rule	Statute
Filing an ACPD costs no more than $10.00	39-4515(1)
Registering a revocation is free	39-4515(1)
You may register online or by mail	39-4515(1)
The department does not review documents for compliance, and registration creates no presumption of validity	39-4515(3)
Not registering has no effect on validity	39-4514(10)
Providers are not required to check the registry	39-4513(4)
A signed written request from you or your surrogate removes your document	39-4515(4)(a)

The department's page does not name the fee it currently charges, so check the registry before you file. Registration helps a provider find your document. It does not make a defective document valid, and a provider is free not to look. Give copies to your agent, your doctor and your hospital regardless.

Old Documents and Directives From Other States

A living will or health care power of attorney you signed under the pre-2023 law still works. Section 39-4514(7) deems any advance care planning document that contained the elements the chapter required at the time of execution to be in compliance.

Chapter 45 has no clause that expressly validates a directive signed in another state. Recognition runs through the definition instead. Section 39-4502(1)(c) counts any document that represents a competent person's authentic expression of health care wishes, and Idaho Code 39-4509(3) says any authentic expression of a person's wishes about health care should be honored. Because Idaho's execution rules are so light, most signed out-of-state directives also meet 39-4510(1) on their face.

What the ACPD Does Not Cover

Mental health treatment has its own document. A declaration for mental health treatment under Idaho Code Title 66, Chapter 6 covers electroconvulsive treatment, psychotropic medication and short-term admission to a treatment facility. It follows stricter rules than the ACPD: Idaho Code 66-604 makes it effective only if signed by you and two competent adult witnesses. Your attending physician or mental health provider, the owner or operator of a facility where you live or are a patient, their relatives, and anyone related to you by blood, marriage or adoption may not witness.

Money decisions need a separate power of attorney. Idaho Code 15-12-103(2) excludes "a power to make health care decisions" from the Uniform Power of Attorney Act. Your ACPD agent handles medical choices, and the financial power of attorney handles bank accounts, bills and property.

Nobody can force you to sign one. Section 39-4514(8)(b) bars providers, insurers and health plans from requiring an ACPD or a DNR order as a condition of coverage or care, and 39-4514(8)(a) protects life insurance from any effect of the document.

A provider may step aside. Under Idaho Code 39-4513(2), a provider unwilling for ethical or professional reasons to follow your wishes may withdraw after making a good-faith effort to help you find another provider who will. Section 39-4513(1) protects providers who follow a facially valid ACPD in good faith, and 39-4513(3) protects an agent who acts in good faith.

Signing an Idaho ACPD: Next Steps

Decide whom to name as your health care agent, and an alternate. Talk through your values with them before you sign.
Choose a document: the department's optional form, a lawyer-drafted directive, or another document with the three required elements.
Fill in your name, date of birth, telephone number and mailing address, then sign and date it. Leave blank any section you do not want to use.
Add a witness or notary only if you want one, such as for a trip to a state with stricter rules.
Give copies to your agent, your doctor and your hospital, and consider filing it with the registry.
If you have a serious illness, ask your practitioner about a POST form.

An ACPD is one piece of a plan. The rest of an Idaho plan covers the will, the financial power of attorney and the trust decisions that sit beside it.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does an Idaho advance directive need to be notarized or witnessed?

No. Idaho Code 39-4510(1) lists everything a valid advance care planning document must contain: your name, date of birth, telephone number and mailing address, your signature or your authorized agent's signature, and the date you signed. Witnesses and notarization appear only in 39-4510(2), the list of things the document may but is not required to include. The Idaho Department of Health and Welfare says an Idaho advance directive must be signed by you and does not need to be notarized or signed by a medical provider.

Does Idaho still have a living will and a separate health care power of attorney?

Not as separate legal instruments. 2023 Idaho Session Laws chapter 307 (House Bill 223), effective July 1, 2023, repealed the old section 39-4510 on living wills and durable powers of attorney for health care and replaced it with one advance care planning document. Naming a health care agent and writing treatment instructions are both optional contents of that one document. The Department of Health and Welfare's optional form still uses the old names for its two parts.

Is my Idaho living will from before 2023 still valid?

Yes, if it met the rules in force when you signed it. Idaho Code 39-4514(7) deems any advance care planning document that contained the elements the chapter required at the time of execution to be in compliance, and directs that the section be liberally construed to give effect to any authentic expression of your prior wishes.

Who makes medical decisions for me in Idaho if I never name an agent?

Idaho Code 39-4504(1) sets the order: a court-appointed guardian, then an agent named in your advance care planning document, then your spouse, an adult child, a parent, a person named in a delegation of parental authority, any relative, and then any other competent individual who represents himself or herself as responsible for your health care. In an emergency with no one available and no way for you to communicate, the attending provider may decide. No surrogate may act against your document or against wishes you expressed while you were capable.

Do I have to file my advance directive with the state?

No. Idaho Code 39-4514(10) says failure to register does not affect the document's validity. The Idaho Healthcare Directive Registry, run by the Department of Health and Welfare under 39-4515, is optional storage. The statute caps the filing fee at $10.00 and bars any fee for registering a revocation. The department does not review documents for compliance, and registration creates no presumption that a document is valid.

How do I revoke an Idaho advance care planning document?

Idaho Code 39-4511A(1) lets you revoke it at any time by destroying it, by a signed written revocation, by telling someone you intend to revoke it, or by any other act that clearly shows that intent. You must tell your health care providers, because 39-4511A(2) lets a provider without actual knowledge of the revocation rely on the document. If you registered it, send the registry a signed written removal request as well.

What is a POST form in Idaho?

POST stands for Physician Orders for Scope of Treatment. Under Idaho Code 39-4512A it is a medical order signed by a licensed independent practitioner and by you or your surrogate. Under 39-4512B(2) a valid POST form counts as a Do Not Resuscitate order at every Idaho health care facility, and under 39-4514(9) it travels with you from home to ambulance, hospital, residential care and hospice.

Sources:

Title: Idaho Code 39-4510, Advance care planning document. Publisher: Idaho State Legislature. Publication Date: 2023-07-01. URL: https://legislature.idaho.gov/statutesrules/idstat/Title39/T39CH45/SECT39-4510/
Title: Idaho Code Title 39, Chapter 45, The Medical Consent and Natural Death Act. Publisher: Idaho State Legislature. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.idaho.gov/statutesrules/idstat/Title39/T39CH45/
Title: Idaho Code 39-4503, Persons who may consent to their own care. Publisher: Idaho State Legislature. Publication Date: 2023-07-01. URL: https://legislature.idaho.gov/statutesrules/idstat/Title39/T39CH45/SECT39-4503/
Title: Idaho Code 39-4504, Persons who may give consent to care for others (effective until January 1, 2027). Publisher: Idaho State Legislature. Publication Date: 2023-07-01. URL: https://legislature.idaho.gov/statutesrules/idstat/Title39/T39CH45/SECT39-4504/
Title: Idaho Code 39-4509, Statement of policy, Definition. Publisher: Idaho State Legislature. Publication Date: 2023-07-01. URL: https://legislature.idaho.gov/statutesrules/idstat/Title39/T39CH45/SECT39-4509/
Title: Idaho Code 39-4511A, Revocation of advance care planning document. Publisher: Idaho State Legislature. Publication Date: 2023-07-01. URL: https://legislature.idaho.gov/statutesrules/idstat/Title39/T39CH45/SECT39-4511A/
Title: Idaho Code 39-4511B, Suspension of advance care planning document. Publisher: Idaho State Legislature. Publication Date: 2023-07-01. URL: https://legislature.idaho.gov/statutesrules/idstat/Title39/T39CH45/SECT39-4511B/
Title: Idaho Code 39-4512, Execution of advance care planning document. Publisher: Idaho State Legislature. Publication Date: 2023-07-01. URL: https://legislature.idaho.gov/statutesrules/idstat/Title39/T39CH45/SECT39-4512/
Title: Idaho Code 39-4512A, Physician orders for scope of treatment (POST). Publisher: Idaho State Legislature. Publication Date: 2023-07-01. URL: https://legislature.idaho.gov/statutesrules/idstat/Title39/T39CH45/SECT39-4512A/
Title: Idaho Code 39-4512B, Adherence to POST protocol. Publisher: Idaho State Legislature. Publication Date: 2023-07-01. URL: https://legislature.idaho.gov/statutesrules/idstat/Title39/T39CH45/SECT39-4512B/
Title: Idaho Code 39-4513, Immunity. Publisher: Idaho State Legislature. Publication Date: 2023-07-01. URL: https://legislature.idaho.gov/statutesrules/idstat/Title39/T39CH45/SECT39-4513/
Title: Idaho Code 39-4514, General provisions. Publisher: Idaho State Legislature. Publication Date: 2023-07-01. URL: https://legislature.idaho.gov/statutesrules/idstat/Title39/T39CH45/SECT39-4514/
Title: Idaho Code 39-4515, Health care directive registry. Publisher: Idaho State Legislature. Publication Date: 2023-07-01. URL: https://legislature.idaho.gov/statutesrules/idstat/Title39/T39CH45/SECT39-4515/
Title: Idaho Code 66-604, Signature, Witnesses. Publisher: Idaho State Legislature. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.idaho.gov/statutesrules/idstat/Title66/T66CH6/SECT66-604/
Title: Idaho Code 15-12-103, Applicability. Publisher: Idaho State Legislature. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.idaho.gov/statutesrules/idstat/Title15/T15CH12/SECT15-12-103/
Title: House Bill 223 (2023), Session Law Chapter 307, Medical Consent and Natural Death Act. Publisher: Idaho State Legislature. Publication Date: 2023-04-05. URL: https://legislature.idaho.gov/sessioninfo/2023/legislation/H0223/
Title: Advance Directives and Registry Services. Publisher: Idaho Department of Health and Welfare. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://healthandwelfare.idaho.gov/services-programs/birth-marriage-death-records/advance-directives-and-registry-services

It is not legal advice.