Massachusetts General Laws

Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 201D, § 2 (2026)

Appointment of health care agents; execution of proxy; alternate agents

✓ current as of July 2026

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Section 2. Every competent adult shall have the right to appoint a health care agent by executing a health care proxy. Said health care proxy shall be in writing signed by such adult or at the direction of such adult in the presence of two other adults who shall subscribe their names as witnesses to such signature. The witnesses shall affirm in writing that the principal appeared to be at least eighteen years of age, of sound mind and under no constraint or undue influence. No person who has been named as health care agent in a health care proxy shall act as a witness to the execution of such proxy. For the purposes of this section, every adult shall be presumed to be competent and every health care proxy shall be presumed to be properly executed unless a court determines otherwise.

A competent adult may designate an alternate health care agent as part of a valid health care proxy. Said alternate may serve when the designated health care agent is not available, willing or competent to serve and the designated health care agent is not expected to become available, willing or competent to make a timely decision given the patient's medical circumstances; or, the health care agent is disqualified from acting on the principal's behalf pursuant to other requirements of this chapter.

Notes of Decisions

Cited in 4 cases (1 in the last 5 years), 2002–2022 · leading case: Susan Gallagher v. South Shore Hosp., Inc., & Others., 101 Mass. App. Ct. 807 (Mass. App. Ct. 2022).

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Susan Gallagher v. South Shore Hosp., Inc., & Others., 101 Mass. App. Ct. 807 (Mass. App. Ct. 2022). · cites it 2× “G. L. c. 201D, § 2. Thus, there is (at least) a genuine dispute whether Pompeo and Page 827 Schoener interfered with Gallagher's and LaPlante's rights by intimidation or coercion.”

Licata v. GGNSC Malden Dexter LLC, 466 Mass. 793 (Mass. 2014). “” G. L. c. 201D, § 2. The proxy authorizes a health care agent to make “health care decisions” on the principal’s behalf should the principal become incompetent.”

Cohen v. Bolduc, 435 Mass. 608 (Mass. 2002). · cites it 2× “G. L. c. 201D, § 2. The agent’s decisions are to be made from the principal’s perspective: they must be in accordance with an “assessment” of her “wishes,” or, if her wishes are unknown, an “assessment” of her “best interests.”

Johnson v. Kindred Healthcare, Inc., 466 Mass. 779 (Mass. 2014). “They claim that, therefore, a health care agent may decide not only whether to admit the principal to a health care facility, but also whether to enter into an agreement to arbitrate claims arising from the principal’s treatment while a resident of the facility.”

Annotations are extracted automatically from the opinions in the Syfert caselaw corpus and ranked by authority, recency, and treatment. Dots show Syfertize treatment of the citing case itself.