Medical expenses can be claimed as an itemized deduction for U.S. federal income tax purposes to the extent they exceed 7.5% of your adjusted gross income.  You can claim medical expenses for yourself, your spouse, and your dependents.  You deduct the medical expenses in the year you paid for them, regardless of when the medical services were provided.  But you do not necessarily have to be able to claim an exemption on your current year tax return in order to claim medical expenses you paid for a spouse or dependent.  The test is whether the person was your spouse or qualified as your dependent at the time the medical services were provided, or at the time you paid for them.  The following are some examples.

Medical Expenses of a Spouse

If you paid for the medical expenses of your present spouse, who received the medical treatment before you were married, you can deduct those medical expenses because you paid them while you were married.  You can deduct these expenses even if you file separate returns instead of filing jointly.

If you paid medical expenses this year, for your spouse who died last year, you can claim a deduction for those expenses this year, because you were married at the time the medical services were provided.  You can deduct the medical expenses paid for your deceased spouse even if you remarried in the current year and file a joint return with your new spouse.

Medical Expenses of a Child or Other Dependent

If you pay medical expenses this year for your child or another person who no longer qualifies as your dependent, but the medical services were provided when the child or other person did qualify as your dependent, you can deduct the medical expenses you paid.

Adopted Chile

In the case of an adopted child, you can include medical expenses you paid before the adoption, if the child qualified as your dependent when the medical services were provided or when you paid for them.  If you pay back an adoption agency or other persons for medical expenses of the child you adopt, you can claim those payments as medical deductions if you can clearly show that the payment was directly for the child’s medical care.

Child of Divorced or Separated Parents

If a child’s parents are divorced, legally separated, or lived apart at all times during the last six months of the year, each parent can include the medical expenses he or she pays for the child, even if the other parent claims the exemption for the child.  This is provided that the child is in the custody of one or both parents for more than half the year and the child receives over half of his or her support during the year from the parents.  In this sense, for purposes of the medical expenses deduction, the child can be treated as a dependent of both parents – each deducts the medical expenses her or she pays.

Multiple Support Agreement

In a multiple support agreement, two or more people provide for a person’s support, but no one alone provides more than half the support.  This may occur, for example, when siblings join together to support one or both of their parents.  If according to the multiple support agreement you are the person who is considered to have provided more than half of a person’s support, you can deduct the medical expenses you pay for that person, even if you cannot claim an exemption for that person on your tax return.

Any medical expenses paid by the other persons who joined you in the multiple support agreement cannot be claimed as medical expenses by anyone. But if you paid medical expenses and were not reimbursed by the other participants in the agreement, you can include the entire amount you paid for medical expenses.

Deceased Dependent

You can include medical expenses you paid for a deceased dependent in the year you paid the expenses, whether this was before or after the date of your dependent’s death.  The same test applies – the person must have qualified as your dependent at the time the medical services were provided or at the time you paid the expenses.