Elder Mediation Can Restore Families

Have you seen the bumper sticker that reads, “I’m spending my children’s inheritance”? Unfortunately, absent such a bumper sticker, many children or other heirs are not aware of their elderly relative’s financial or physical status until the person is in a crisis situation, or, worse, has already died. At that point there is often a rush to the courthouse to duke it out for control of Mom or Dad’s assets or to get a “fair” share of the estate. As all lawyers know, the only winners of a courthouse battle are the lawyers, and, unless you are a personal injury attorney, you have probably wondered if there is a reliable and effective way to keep litigious heirs or would-be-guardians out of court. Well, look no further.

Utilizing Elder Mediation to settle family disputes before going to court provides clients and their families with a more meaningful and usually less costly solution to conflict than that provided by litigation, allowing the senior to participate in the decision-making process to the best of his or her ability. It also affords a lawyer a non-litigious, attractive service to offer prospective clients. This type of service to families distinguishes an attorney from other lawyers and law firms, particularly during difficult economic conditions.

Rebekah Lorenz has written an excellent article on Elder Mediation and how it can serve seniors and their families. It is entitled "Elder Mediation for Texas Attorneys: Avoiding Conflict Before It Begins (and Building Your Practice While You’re At It). Here's an excerpt from it:

Part I. What Is Elder Mediation?

Elder mediation is a mediation style that focuses on disputes involving the elderly in areas such as guardianships, probate, and long-term care planning. It utilizes a neutral mediator whose role is to encourage and facilitate discussion of relevant issues among the parties and help them come to a mutually satisfactory agreement. Because the mediator is supposed to be neutral, he is not take on a decision-making role in advising the parties on what he believes to be the best solution. Rather, he is to help come up with alternatives and facilitate problem-solving and creative thinking among the parties so that ultimately it is the parties who formulate and adopt the final agreement, if one is reached. The parties may reduce their agreement to a legally binding contract if they choose, or may agree that the results will not be legally binding, but are in the mutual best interests of all involved. 

Elder Mediation was born out of efforts to promote the use of alternative dispute resolution in conflicts involving the disabled (who were often elderly). In the early 1990s the Center for Social Gerontology began implementing pilot projects to test the effectiveness of mediation in contested guardianship cases, and expanded these efforts in 2001 to include family caregiver decision-making and conflict resolution projects to help families arrive at collaborative agreements rather than seeking court-ordered guardianships. In a 2001 report on four of the state pilot projects, the Center stated that it found Elder Mediation to be successful in three out of four guardianship cases where appropriate screening protocol were observed....

See the PowerPoint below and read the entire article here.