LP1H is the form people put off, because it asks a question the other one does not: what you want to happen about treatment that keeps you alive. That question sits in section 5, and it has to be signed and witnessed before anything else on the form. This walks the whole form in order, using the Office of the Public Guardian’s own LP12 guide as the source.
Before section 1
A health and welfare LPA lets your attorneys make decisions about your daily care, your medical treatment and where you live, and, if you choose it, about life-sustaining treatment. It does nothing about money or property; that is LP1F, our property and financial affairs walkthrough. You can make one or both.
The rule that shapes every section is stated by the OPG in section 5: unlike the property and financial affairs form, your attorneys can only begin to act under this LPA once you have lost mental capacity (GOV.UK, LP12 guide, checked 10 September 2026). Capacity means the ability to make and understand a specific decision at the time it needs to be made, so an attorney’s authority can apply to one decision and not another.
You must have capacity to make the LPA itself, and be 18 or over. Someone else can fill in the form, but the guide says only you can choose what goes into it.
Section 1: the donor
Your name, date of birth and address, with an optional email address. Give every name you are known by, including a married name, because the guide warns that an LPA missing one of them can cause confusion or delays when your attorneys come to use it (GOV.UK, LP12 guide, checked 10 September 2026).
The bankruptcy complication the guide mentions applies to the property and financial affairs form, not this one.
Section 2: the attorneys
Full names, addresses and dates of birth. Any order; the guide says each attorney is as important as the others. Four fit on the form, and more go on continuation sheet 1, signed and dated before you sign section 9. You need at least one attorney, and each must be 18 or over (GOV.UK, Choose your attorney, checked 1 November 2026).
The guide’s practical warning applies with particular force here: make sure each person has agreed before you name them. An attorney under this form may one day be asked about treatment you cannot consent to yourself, and the guide says an attorney can object to their appointment later and stop the LPA being registered.
Section 3: how your attorneys make decisions
Mark one box. With one attorney, tick “I only appointed one attorney”. With more than one, choose jointly and severally, jointly, or jointly for some decisions and jointly and severally for others (GOV.UK, LP12 guide, checked 10 September 2026). Leave it blank and the guide says the law appoints them jointly.
The guide’s two health and welfare examples of the mixed option are the ones people actually reach for: “My attorneys must act jointly for decisions about where I live and may act jointly and severally for everything else”, and “My attorneys must act jointly for decisions I have authorised them to make about life-sustaining treatment and may act jointly and severally for everything else”. Either goes on continuation sheet 2.
The second example only works if you have chosen option A in section 5, because it presumes your attorneys have that authority in the first place. The guide says most people choose jointly and severally as the most flexible option, and warns that under any other option a decision the attorneys cannot agree on cannot be made.
Section 4: replacement attorneys
Optional. A replacement steps in automatically if an original attorney dies, loses mental capacity, or disclaims the role (GOV.UK, LP12 guide, checked 10 September 2026). If you name none, the section is left blank and the page stays in the document. Two fit on the form.
The box for changing how or when replacements act carries the guide’s own warning that it can create complications, with a suggestion of legal advice. Without a specific reason, it stays unmarked.
Section 5: life-sustaining treatment
Only LP1H has this section, and the OPG says it must be completed correctly or it may not be able to register the LPA. You sign one of two options, and the choice is about who decides on treatment that keeps you alive (GOV.UK, LP12 guide, checked 1 November 2026).
Option A: I give my attorneys authority to give or refuse consent to life-sustaining treatment on my behalf. Option B: I do not give my attorneys authority to give or refuse consent to life-sustaining treatment on my behalf (LP12 guide, checked 1 November 2026).
Under option B, the guide says, doctors will make decisions about life-sustaining treatment. Under option A your attorneys make them, and your preferences and instructions in section 7 are what they have to work from. Neither is the correct answer; the form is asking what you want.
The mechanics are exact. You sign and date this page, and your signature is witnessed by someone aged 18 or over who is not an attorney or replacement attorney, giving their full name and address across the bottom of the page. You sign section 5 before you sign section 9, and the guide says both can be done on the same day. If you have directed someone else to sign for you, they sign and date this page too, witnessed, and complete continuation sheet 3 at the same time.
The guide’s closing line on this section is the reason to check it twice: complete it incorrectly or leave information out, and the OPG may not be able to register your LPA, and you may have to pay a fee again to complete another one.
Section 6: people to notify
Optional. Up to five people who will be told when the LPA is sent for registration and who can object if they think you were pressured or that fraud was involved. Four on the form, a fifth on continuation sheet 1 (GOV.UK, LP12 guide, checked 10 September 2026).
Whoever applies to register uses form LP3 to notify them immediately before sending the LPA, and they have three weeks to raise concerns.
Section 7: preferences and instructions
Optional, and on this form it is where your wishes about care and treatment live. Preferences are guidance your attorneys should keep in mind; instructions must be followed. The OPG’s wording, “I would like” against “My attorneys must”, keeps them apart, and our forms page sets it out.
An unlawful instruction has to be removed by the Court of Protection before registration, with assisted dying as the OPG’s own example.
Money instructions do not belong here. Instructions cannot cross between the two forms.
Section 8: your legal rights and responsibilities
An information page you do not fill in but must keep in the document. It is where you, your attorneys and your certificate provider read what each of you is agreeing to, and it is part of the form, so it stays in. Remove it and the form is incomplete.
Sections 9 to 11: the signatures
On this form the order begins earlier: section 5 first, witnessed, then any continuation sheets, then you in section 9, witnessed. The certificate provider signs section 10 after you, and each attorney signs section 11 after that, each witnessed. Who may witness which section, and who may be the certificate provider, is on our forms page.
Sections 12 to 15: registering it
Section 12 asks who is applying to register. Section 13 asks who the OPG should contact and send the registered LPA to. Section 14 is the fee, with boxes for a reduced fee, which sends you to form LPA120, and for a repeat application within three months. Section 15 is the applicant’s signature (GOV.UK, LP12 guide, checked 10 September 2026).
The fee is £92, halved to £46 if the donor’s income before tax is £12,000 or less, and nothing at all if they receive the Guarantee Credit part of Pension Credit or certain other means-tested benefits. Our cost page sets out who pays what and the evidence the OPG wants. Registration takes 8 to 10 weeks if there are no mistakes (GOV.UK, Register a lasting power of attorney, checked 1 November 2026).
If you are not sure this is the form you need
Our which form do I need tool asks five questions and tells you whether it is LP1H, LP1F, both, or something else entirely, and what the fee would be. It takes a minute, it never asks for a name or an email, and nothing you enter leaves your browser.