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Content is anchored to trusted sources where available, but Compass has not yet been clinically reviewed. It provides general information rather than medical advice.

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Care and support systems

Substitute decision-maker

The person who makes decisions on your behalf when you cannot make them yourself.

What it means

Sometimes appointed by you in a document, and sometimes set by law when no document exists, which may not be the person you would have chosen. What they are asked to weigh differs between places, and usually includes what you would have wanted, which is why telling them matters as much as naming them.

Why you might hear it

  • Teams ask who this is when a decision has to be made urgently.
  • Naming somebody without talking to them is the common gap.

People who may help

Where Compass goes into this

About this explanation

These are plain explanations of words you may come across, not advice about your own situation. Where a word matters to a decision, the question pages go into it properly, and your own team is the place to take it.