Wednesday, 11 March 2026
Chair
Darlene Skennar KC, Inns of Court; Leading Wills & Estates Litigation Senior Counsel, Doyle’s Guide 2025
Testamentary Capacity: Evidence, Process and Pitfalls in Contemporaneous and Retrospective Assessments
- Writing letters of instructions and providing relevant documents
- Medical considerations and pitfalls in capacity determinations
- Psychometric testing and its relationship to capacity
- Undue influence and voluntariness
- What to expect from an expert report
Presented by Professor Philip Morris AM, Psychiatrist , Gold Coast Specialist Rooms and Dr Simon Zuscak, Clinical Psychologist, Clinical Corporate Consulting
Description
Attend and earn 0.5 CPD unit in Substantive Law
This program is based on QLD legislation
* This interactive online recording includes questions and quizzes requiring critical thinking about the topics, so you have no annual limits to the number of points/hours you can claim with this format of learning. Please verify with your CPD rules
Presenters
Dr Simon Zuscak, Clinical Psychologist, Clinical Corporate Consulting
Dr Simon Zuscak (clinical psychologist) has qualifications including a Bachelor's of Applied Psychology with Honours, a Master's Degree in Clinical Psychology, and a PhD. He is a Fellow of the APS and a member of the International Psychogeriatric Association. He has a special interest in assessing decisional capacity. The topic of this PhD thesis was A Psycho-Legal Protocol for Assessing Testamentary Capacity and Capacity to Appoint an Enduring Attorney. Dr Zuscak has been assessing cognition and associated functioning through a specialised clinic in collaboration with Prof. Morris since 2008 and has been an independent rater of mental status in pharmacological research since 2011. He has presented and published on legal decision-making capacity.
Professor Philip Morris AM, Psychiatrist, Gold Coast Specialist Rooms
Prof. Philip Morris (psychiatrist) has medical qualifications MBBS (Hons), BSc(med) (Hons), and PhD. He is qualified in psychiatry and addiction medicine in Australia and is a Fellow of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists (FRANZCP) and a Fellow of the Australasian Chapter of Addiction Medicine (FAChAM) of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians (RACP). He is qualified in general adult psychiatry and geriatric psychiatry in both Australia and the USA and is Board Certified by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology (AmBPN). Prof. Morris is a member of the Faculty of Old Age Psychiatry and the Faculty of Forensic Psychiatry of the RANZCP. Prof. Morris is a Distinguished Fellow of the Pacific Rim College of Psychiatry. He is President of the National Association of Practising Psychiatrists. Prof. Morris is Executive Director of the Australian and New Zealand Mental Health Association. He is Medical Director of the Gold Coast Memory Disorders Clinic. He has a private psychiatric, psychogeriatric (old age psychiatry), and medico-legal practice on the Gold Coast.
Darlene Skennar KC, Inns of Court
Darlene Skennar KC took silk in 2017. She has a Bachelor of Laws (Hons) (QIT) and a Master of Laws (QUT). Darlene was the associate to Justice Moynihan of the Supreme Court. Darlene was a part-time tutor at the Queensland University of Technology for a number of years. Darlene has been in full time practice as a barrister since 1989. Darlene has a wide estate litigation experience. Darlene is a former member of the Pharmacists Board of Queensland and the Surveyors Board of Queensland.
