How Long Does a West Virginia Caregiver Affidavit Last?

The One-Year Clock

Under W. Va. Code §49-2-703, the Caregiver Consent Affidavit for Health Care is valid for up to one year from the date you sign it before a notary. That is a hard statutory ceiling — there is no provision to extend it beyond 12 months. When the year is up, the affidavit expires and healthcare providers lose their statutory basis for accepting your consent.

The same one-year maximum applies to the Statutory Power of Attorney under §49-8-4, which must state explicit start and end dates.

Two Ways the Affidavit Ends Early

The affidavit can expire before the one-year mark in two situations:

The child leaves your home. If the minor stops residing with you, the affidavit terminates automatically. You do not need to formally revoke it — once the child is no longer in your household, the legal authority is gone.

A parent revokes it. A parent, guardian, or legal custodian can cancel the affidavit at any time by providing written notice to the healthcare providers serving the child. Once revoked, you must notify any provider or health plan that was relying on the affidavit. You cannot continue using it after revocation — doing so would constitute a false representation under the statute.

How to Renew

There is no renewal form. When the affidavit is about to expire and the child is still in your care, you execute a brand-new affidavit from scratch: fill out the form, sign under oath before a notary, and deliver the fresh document to every provider who has the old one. The same eligibility requirements apply each time — relative status or six months of continuous residence for non-relatives, and the parental-signature rules.

Schedule the renewal before the old affidavit expires, not after. A gap in coverage means a provider might decline to treat the child during the window between expiration and the new notarization.

Tracking the Expiration Date

The simplest protection against a lapse is writing the expiration date somewhere you will see it — your phone calendar, a paper calendar on the refrigerator, or the tracking worksheets in your caregiving file. Set a reminder 30 days before expiration to start the renewal process.

If you also hold a power of attorney, track that expiration separately. The two instruments may have been executed on different dates.

What Happens If You Miss the Deadline

If the affidavit expires and you have not renewed:

• Providers are no longer protected by the good-faith immunity in §49-2-705 for relying on your consent.
• Some providers will continue treating the child under established relationships, but they have no legal obligation to do so.
• New providers — an urgent care clinic you have never visited, a specialist referral — will almost certainly require a current document before proceeding.
• The child's coverage under insurance plans linked to the affidavit may also lapse depending on the insurer's requirements.

An expired affidavit does not erase your history as a caregiver or create legal trouble on its own. It simply means the statutory authority has run out and needs to be re-established.

When One Year Is Not Enough

If you know the child will be in your care indefinitely — because a parent is incarcerated for years, has died, or has permanently abandoned the family — consider guardianship under §44-10-3. A court guardianship order lasts until the child turns 18 and does not require annual renewal. It also carries more institutional weight than a renewable affidavit.

For help tracking every expiration date and planning your renewal timeline alongside school enrollment deadlines and benefit applications, our West Virginia school and medical consent guide includes a statutory expiry tracker worksheet built around the one-year cycle.

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