Measuring the Applicability of the Legal Capacity Assesment Form in Cases That are Requieredto Adress Legal Capacity Due to Old Age

According to the Turkish Civil Code, individual's capability to act is related to act in accordance with the law and to be held accountable for the acts that are contrary to the law. Every adult who has the power to distinguish and who is not restricted has an capability to act. In terms of law, individual must have the power to distinguish and should not be restricted for a complete action competence. Notary, courts, land registry offices and similar institutions request report on the ability of individual to perceive the legal meaning and consequences of the act from physician. One of the reasons in order to be requested this report is that the person who is going to act is 65 years of age or older. It is seen that there is no standard for the requested reports related to capacity to act and legal capacity for the elderly in our country. According to the current legal regulations, it is seen that all physicians have the authority to draw up these reports. However, it is not clear in which circumstances it is necessary to carry out further evaluation and which specialist branches should make these evaluations. In this study, it is aimed to determine the applicability of the Legal Capacity Assessment Form developed in forensic psychiatric practices. The applicability of this form is important in terms of ensuring standard in the following applications and dissemination of thes standard.In practice, the report on the legal capacity is still drawn up in our Forensic Medicine Department. No certain scale is used in routine practice. Physicians working in our department are trying to understand whether or not persons older than 65 years have legal capacity being made by forensic psychiatric examination. Informed consent is routinely applied to these patients. The research is planned in a 6 month period after approval of the ethics committee. All patients aged 65 years and over who apply to the ESOGü Faculty of Medicine Forensic Medicine Deartment for the report on legal capacity and capacity to act will be evaluated. Legal Capacity Assessment Form and mini mental test will be applied to all patients by two different practitioners. The results from the form were compared with the final forensic psychiatric evaluation of the patient. The elderly with a Legal Capacity Assessment Form score of 12 points or more were judged to have legal capacity in accordance with routine forensic psychiatric evalutiation. ？t was determined that the results were consistent and meaningful even though the Legal Capacity Assessment Form was conducted by two different practioners.