The short answer
Planning ahead can reduce the financial, legal, and emotional burdens your family may face later. Steps include completing advance directives, checking your insurance, organizing important records, and, if you wish, sharing your funeral or memorial preferences.
Careful planning reduces the financial, legal, and emotional burdens your family may face later.
Completing advance directives keeps you in control of your care decisions.
Check with your insurance company before starting new treatment or hospice.
Organizing records and telling family where to find them makes things easier for loved ones.
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The full explanation.
Why planning ahead helps
Thinking about the future can feel stressful, but there comes a time when it is helpful to make certain decisions. Careful planning reduces the financial, legal, and emotional burdens your family will face after you are gone.
For many people, it is hard to bring up these subjects. But talking about them now can avoid problems later. Taking these steps is also a way of caring for the people you love.
Complete your advance directives
If you have not done so already, it is important to fill out advance directives. These are legal papers that tell your loved ones and doctors what to do for you if you cannot tell them yourself.
Making these decisions now keeps you in control of how you want to be treated, and who you choose to be in charge of your care. By filling out advance directives, you are making your wishes known for all to follow. Doing so can also give your loved ones peace of mind.
Update your insurance
Contact your health insurance company if you decide to try a new treatment or go into hospice. Most insurance plans cover hospice. They may also cover brief home visits from a nurse or a home health aide several times a week.
It is wise to ask in advance. Checking your coverage early may prevent payment problems later.
Put your affairs in order
You can help your family by organizing records, insurance policies, documents, and instructions. You may want to call a lawyer or financial planner to make sure you have taken all the right steps. Your bank can answer questions about how to change accounts and credit cards.
Some helpful steps include:
- Make a list of where your family can find important papers.
- Keep your papers in a fireproof box or with a lawyer.
- If your papers are in a safety deposit box, make sure a family member or friend can access it.
- Although original documents are needed for legal purposes, give family members photocopies.
Papers your family may need
You may not need everything on this list, but it can serve as a guide. Write down contact information and what needs to be done for:
- banks, savings, and loans
- safety deposit box information
- life insurance company
- health insurance company
- homeowners' or renters' insurance company
- attorneys
- accountant
- pension or retirement plans
- investment companies
- credit card companies
- employer
Gathering these details in one place can spare your loved ones a great deal of searching and stress later on.
Sharing your wishes for a service
If it feels right to you, you may want to help your family plan a funeral or memorial service that has meaning to you. Although this may seem hard, planning it ahead of time can help your loved ones after your death. It eases the burden of having to make these choices themselves during a time of strong emotions and stress.
Some people plan services that are celebrations, while others prefer something more subdued. There is no single right way. If you would like to, talk with your family about the type of service you would want. And remember, you do not have to take all of these steps at once, or alone; your health care team, a social worker, a lawyer, or a financial planner can help.
Words to know
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Common questions
Why plan ahead financially and legally?
Thinking about the future can feel stressful, but careful planning reduces the financial, legal, and emotional burdens your family will face after you are gone. For many people it is hard to bring up these subjects, but talking about them now can avoid problems later.
What should I do about advance directives?
If you have not already, it is important to fill out advance directives. These are legal papers that tell your loved ones and doctors what to do for you if you cannot tell them yourself. Making these decisions now keeps you in control of how you want to be treated and who is in charge of your care.
What about my insurance?
Contact your health insurance company if you decide to try a new treatment or go into hospice. Most plans cover hospice, and may also cover brief home visits from a nurse or home health aide several times a week. Ask in advance to help prevent payment problems later.
How can I organize my affairs?
You can help your family by organizing records, insurance policies, documents, and instructions. You may want to call a lawyer or financial planner. Make a list of where important papers are, keep them in a safe place, and give family members photocopies while keeping originals secure.
What papers might my family need?
You may not need everything, but a helpful guide includes information for banks and savings, safety deposit boxes, life and health insurance, home insurance, attorneys, accountants, pension or retirement plans, investment companies, credit card companies, and your employer.
Should I plan a funeral or memorial service?
Only if it feels right to you. Some people want to help plan a service that has meaning to them. Doing this ahead of time can ease the burden on loved ones during a time of strong emotions. You can talk with your family about the type of service you would like.
Questions to ask your doctor
Being prepared helps you get the most out of your appointments. Save or print these questions.
Tap a question to save it to your list (kept on this device).
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Where to get help with this, by name
A hospital social worker or financial navigator is the best first call if you have one. If you do not, these organisations help at no cost to you.
- Patient Advocate Foundation — (800) 532-5274. Case managers take on insurance appeals, denials and medical debt with you. Free.
- TotalAssist (Patient Advocate Foundation's copay programme, merged with the PAN Foundation in 2026) — 866-512-3861. Help with medication copays, coinsurance and deductibles, insurance premiums, and office-visit and administration charges on the day of treatment, across nearly 150 conditions.
- CancerCare — 800-813-HOPE (4673). Oncology social workers, free counselling and support groups. Limited financial help with transport, home care, child care and lodging for people in active treatment who meet their income guidelines — funding is first-come, first-served, so call to ask what is open.
- Triage Cancer — 424-258-4628. Free legal and financial navigation: insurance, employment rights, disability.
- Blood Cancer United (formerly the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society) — (800) 955-4572. Information Specialists answer questions on treatment, insurance and financial problems.
- HealthCare.gov — 1-800-318-2596. For questions about the external review process — the independent review your insurer is required by law to accept.
Your state Department of Insurance regulates insurers and takes consumer complaints. On Medicare, your State Health Insurance Assistance Program (SHIP) gives free one-to-one counselling. If a specific drug is the problem, ask the manufacturer about its patient assistance programme.
Phone numbers checked 31 July 2026. Programmes and eligibility change — if a number has moved, please tell us.
Plain-language explanation of the published sources cited on this page. AI-assisted, source-checked, not clinician-reviewed.
Sources last checked: 2026-07-14 what this meansLast updated: 2026-07-14Next planned review: 2027-07-14
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How this page was created
Cancer Explained does not originate medical claims. Every page restates guidance already published by the National Cancer Institute, the CDC, the USPSTF and the FDA, in plain language, with the source cited so you can check the original yourself. AI does the translating and organizing; automated checks test claims, citations, clarity and safety before anything publishes. We do not employ clinicians and do not intend to — our work is translation and navigation, not clinical judgment. Nothing here is personal medical advice, and no page can account for your particular situation.
Editorial status: Source checked — This page was written with AI assistance and checked line by line against the sources listed on it. That confirms the sources support what the page says. It is not a medical review, and it does not confirm the page is complete or right for your situation.
Human medical review: not completed. Pages here are not signed off by a clinician before they publish. That is not an oversight we are quietly working around: we restate published guidance and cite it, so the authority belongs to the source rather than to us, and every page names where its claims come from — you can verify us instead of trusting us. Where a volunteer clinician has reviewed a page, their name and credentials appear on it; where no name appears, no clinician has checked it. We are glad to have reviewers and are recruiting them, and we do not hold pages back waiting for one. Use this site to understand your situation and to ask better questions of the people treating you.
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