I have POA (Financial & Medical) over my mom (77). She lives in assisted living. What are my rights? Her primary care Dr. sucks.

Get rid of him. I wouldn't even bother to send a letter. As her Medical POA you have the right to do that. Its in her best interest. Anything dealing with her Dementia I would be seeing a Neurologist. I don't feel PCP have the knowledge to deal with Dementias.

As mentioned below, send a written request to the doctor to talk over the phone. I would phrase this as " to review my moms current medication regimen ".

I discovered early on to go gently into discussions that involved anything that had been reported to me as fact by my mother, who, like you mom, had dementia.

I will also mention that when my mom first went to Independent Living, her doctor, a geriatrician, took mom off ALL of her complicated hear meds, osteoporosis meds, etc. He kept her on bp meds.

Is the cough syrup benadryl? That is at times recommended as a sleep aid for seniors.

Wow! Vitamin C and cough syrup... that sounds pretty curative. Her AL facility should have a dr.(hospitalist) assigned to the facility. See if you can have him/her designated as her PCP. If not, seek out another PCP.

Read your HCPOA to see what your rights/responsibilities are under that document. You are still her advocate and your POA overrides any HIPPA concerns the current dr. may have. If he has a copy of the HCPOA, he needs to share medical info.

Do you have medical POA? Because mental is not the same thing.

If not, that is why the doctor won't talk to you.

If you do then you need to send a certified, return receipt letter explaining that you are MEDICAL POA and you would like to know what is going on. Give him a deadline for answering, like 10 days and then file a complaint with the AMA and your state licensing board if he ignores the request.