Amend the bill by striking out the title and substituting the following:

Amend the bill by striking out everything after the enacting clause and before the summary and inserting the following:

summary

This amendment replaces the bill. Unlike the bill, which authorizes a "caretaker relative" to make medical and educational decisions for a minor, this amendment addresses only the issues related to health care for minors.

This amendment makes changes to the laws governing minors' authority to consent to health care by identifying situations in which adults who voluntarily and without specific legal authority through a power of attorney or appointment as a legal guardian provide care that a parent normally would. This amendment recognizes that when parents are temporarily absent from a minor's life, certain adults with whom a minor resides may assume a surrogate role. As defined in the amendment, a surrogate may not be a parent, legal guardian or an adult to whom a parent has given a power of attorney authorizing health care treatment for the minor. Surrogates may include an adult related to a minor by blood, marriage or adoption and from whom the minor receives the ongoing care and support expected of a parent. If no such relatives exist, an adult with whom the minor resides and who has provided the minor with the ongoing care and support expected of a parent may act as a surrogate. The existence of a surrogate does not remove the ability of a minor to give consent under any other existing law.

If a minor needs health care, a surrogate must make a good faith attempt to notify the minor's parents or legal guardian of their right to make those decisions unless parental notification is not required by other provisions of law. Absent a response, the surrogate may make most health care decisions on behalf of the minor without parental consent. A surrogate may not make decisions withholding or withdrawing life-sustaining treatments or denying consent for treatments that are life-saving and medically necessary. A surrogate giving consent on behalf of the minor must attempt to make a good faith effort to notify the absent parents or legal guardian of any health care received by the minor unless parental notification is not required by other provisions of law.

Health care practitioners and providers may rely on the consent given by the surrogate. If they do so, they are immune from liability for providing treatment without receiving informed consent from the parents or legal guardian. Health care practitioners and providers must inform the surrogate of the surrogate's obligation to notify the minor's parents or legal guardian about the minor's treatment.

This amendment allows the surrogate to use the means of communication the surrogate believes is the most effective way to ensure actual notification of the parents or legal guardian. The means of communication may be regular mail, e-mail, texting, personal website posting or other written means of communication to the last known address or contacting by telephone using the last known telephone number of the absent parents or legal guardian.

This amendment provides that a surrogate who makes health care decisions for the minor knowing that those specific decisions may not be made by the surrogate or without attempting to contact the parents or legal guardian about the need for the health care or the health care received commits a Class E crime. A person who makes health care decisions for a minor when not qualified as a surrogate is guilty of a Class E crime.

This amendment provides that, as long as the health care practitioner or provider acts with good faith reliance on the consent of the surrogate, there is no liability against the health care practitioner or provider on the grounds that the health care treatment was rendered without informed consent.

This amendment clarifies that a minor may consent to health services associated with a sexual assault forensic examination to collect evidence after an alleged sexual assault regardless of whether a surrogate exists.