The professional will: executor, access, notices, records

What a professional will is, and why a solo practice needs one

A professional will is a written plan that tells someone you trust exactly what to do with your practice if you die suddenly or become unable to work. For a group, partners absorb the caseload. For a solo, no one else holds the passwords, the client list, or the legal authority — so without a will your clients, your records, and your estate are left stranded.

Professional associations treat the professional will as standard practice-management planning, published alongside closing-a-practice guidance 1Ref 1APA Services, Inc. (2026).Practice — APA Services.That professional bodies publish practice-management guidance treating the professional will and practice-closure planning as standard for solo clinicians.. It is best drafted at practice formation rather than deferred, and it pairs with the same continuity thinking that leaving a panel or firing a patient already demands. One state-specific caution belongs on the first page: how long records must be kept, and who may legally serve as their custodian, are set by your state and licensing board — so the will names your state's rule, not a national default.

The anatomy at a glance

A complete professional will has seven working parts, and a thin one — a name and a password taped inside a drawer — fails at the first real question your executor faces. Treat each row below as a section the document must actually contain, with names, contact paths, and enough instruction that someone who has never seen your practice can act without guessing.

The executor: who you name and the authority they hold

Your professional executor is the colleague — usually a fellow licensed clinician — who carries out the plan. Name them, name an alternate, and confirm both have agreed in writing; an executor who first learns of the role at your funeral is not an executor. A common convention is to compensate the executor from the estate for the real hours the wind-down takes, and to keep the clinical tasks, such as contacting active clients, with someone who holds the same license you do.

Give the executor real standing. A checklist without authority stalls the moment a bank or an EHR vendor asks who this person is. Aligning the professional will with your personal estate documents gives the executor power those institutions will recognize. When to bring in counsel is itself the trigger: the moment the plan touches money, contracts, or protected health information held by a vendor, a short memo from an attorney can save your executor weeks.

Access: credentials, the EHR vendor, and the sealed envelope

Your executor cannot act on access they do not have. The will points to one current location — a password manager entry, or a sealed envelope in a known place — holding the EHR admin login, email, bank, merchant processor, and phone system. It also names your EHR, billing service, and answering service explicitly, because each is a business associate under HIPAA and the will has to let your executor invoke the business-associate agreement to retrieve or transfer the data 2Ref 2HHS Office for Civil Rights (2026).Business Associates.That a solo practice's EHR, billing service, and answering service are business associates whose agreements the executor must be able to invoke to reach or transfer PHI..

Keep it current. An access list that points at a password you rotated last spring is worse than none, because your executor will trust it and lose hours to it. Tie the review to a fixed date each year, and note anywhere a second factor or a hardware key would otherwise lock the executor out.

Client notices and each client's right to their records

Clients must be told, and they keep every records right they had while you were practicing. The will scripts who contacts clients, in what order — active and higher-acuity clients first — and by what channel, with wording that offers continuity options without diagnosing anyone in a letter. It then hands the ongoing job to your records custodian, who must still answer a client's request for a copy within 30 days, with one 30-day extension, at a reasonable cost-based fee 3Ref 3HHS Office for Civil Rights (2026).Individuals' Right under HIPAA to Access their Health Information.That clients retain the right to inspect and obtain copies of their records within 30 days (one 30-day extension) at a reasonable cost-based fee, and that psychotherapy notes are excluded from that access right..

Two constraints shape the custodian's job. Psychotherapy notes are excluded from the standard access right, so those follow a tighter, separate rule 3Ref 3HHS Office for Civil Rights (2026).Individuals' Right under HIPAA to Access their Health Information.That clients retain the right to inspect and obtain copies of their records within 30 days (one 30-day extension) at a reasonable cost-based fee, and that psychotherapy notes are excluded from that access right.. And the Cures Act's information-blocking rule bars a practice — including its successor — from interfering with a patient's access to electronic health information, subject to eight defined exceptions 4Ref 4Office of the National Coordinator / ASTP (2026).Information Blocking.That the 21st Century Cures Act information-blocking rule bars a practice or its successor from interfering with access to electronic health information, subject to eight defined exceptions.; an estate that simply ignores records requests can create a second problem on top of a death. The mirror situation — what happens to a chart when a patient dies — runs on its own rules and is worth keeping straight from this one.

The records custodian: storage, retention, and disposition

The records custodian is whoever legally holds your charts after you stop practicing, and the will names them by agreement, not assumption. Their duties are storage in a secure form, retention for the required period, lawful release to clients and their new providers, and eventual destruction. Record-keeping guidance frames these core tasks and offers seven years after the last service for an adult as an illustrative floor — longer for minors — while deferring, every time, to state law 5Ref 5American Psychological Association (2007).Record Keeping Guidelines.That record-keeping guidance frames a records custodian's storage, retention, and disposition duties and offers seven years after the last service for adults as an illustrative floor, always deferring to state law..

State law is the controlling authority here, and it genuinely varies: some boards set a longer minimum, some shorter, and some regulate who may serve as custodian at all. Maryland's board, for one, publishes its own retention and practice-closure rules for the professionals it licenses 6Ref 6Maryland Board of Professional Counselors and Therapists (2026).Maryland Board of Professional Counselors and Therapists.Maryland's board as one state example of a licensing authority publishing its own retention and practice-closure rules, illustrating that the controlling number is state-set, not national. — that is one example, not the national rule, and your own board's published requirement is the one your will must cite. Build the custodian's retention clock off that number, and record the destruction method (secure shredding, certified data wipe) the custodian will use when the clock runs out.

Loose ends: subpoenas, billing wind-down, and the malpractice tail

Legal process does not stop when you do. Subpoenas and court orders keep arriving at a closed practice, and the custodian has to answer them correctly: a court order authorizes disclosure of exactly what it names, while a subpoena without a court order requires satisfactory assurances — notice to the client or a protective order — before anything is released 7Ref 7HHS Office for Civil Rights (2026).Court Orders and Subpoenas.That a court order authorizes disclosure of only what it names, while a subpoena without a court order requires satisfactory assurances (notice or a protective order) before release.. The will tells your executor who handles this and when to call counsel.

Billing wind-down. Name who closes open claims, issues refunds for credit balances, and files the final tax and payroll items; an executor without banking access cannot refund a patient who overpaid.

The malpractice tail. Claims-made coverage ends when the policy does, but a claim can be filed long after. A common step is to record where the policy lives and whether tail coverage is already purchased or must be bought by the estate, because a gap here exposes the estate to a claim brought after your death.

Keeping the will current

A professional will decays the moment you sign it — passwords rotate, your EHR changes, clients come and go, and your executor may move away. A common convention is to review it on a fixed annual date and after any structural change: a new EHR, a move, a new bank, a change of executor. Store the signed original where your executor and your attorney can both reach it, and destroy superseded versions so no one acts on a stale plan.

A short, deliberate maintenance rhythm keeps the document trustworthy. Pair the annual review with the same date you refresh the access list, confirm both the executor and the alternate still consent, and re-check that your named custodian is still willing and still eligible under your board's current rule.