Step 8: Address Legal, Financial, and Workplace Issues

If being a cancer patient is a job, then this part requires you to put on your business manager's hat. You've got to attend to the paperwork such as the hospital and doctor bills, insurance forms, and prescriptions. Then there are other issues: tending to your financial and legal affairs, making sure your will is in order, preparing an Advance Directive. Although these are not pleasant things to think about, if you deal with these issues promptly, early in your illness, and without attaching too much emotion to them, you will feel a lot better and be able to focus your attention where it should be focused on your health. There are attorneys, insurance specialist and professional cancer patient advocates who can help you with getting the job done.

Legal: Delegate Authority in Advance
From a legal point of few, here are some issues you'll want to consider.

Advance directive
To make medical decisions for you if you are unable to make them yourself, you'll want to think about creating an advance directive, a general term that applies to two types of legal documents: