I’ve been flying 2,000 miles to TX 2-3x/year for the past 8 years to visit my now-96-year-old father whose health has long been failing. The cost of these trips has added up to close to $10,000. Recently someone suggested that I reduce my air fare expenses this time by declaring it as a professional expense. Ie., since I am a physical therapist and my father is currently receiving physical therapy as an inpatient in a rehabilitation facility, I should ask the P.T. department if I could pay a visit to learn how they run their department, observe their treatment techniques, etc. This would be easy to do since I want to accompany my father to his P.T. treatment a couple of times anyway, and I indeed want to learn how their treatment techniques might differ from my P.T. facility’s techniques; thus the claim that I visited their department for ‘professional education’ reasons would be legitimate.
But how does one document such a visit for the IRS? What kind of proof would I need? I’ve deducted air fare for professional enhancement before when I’ve flown OOS for seminars, but in these cases my course registration serves as proof. How do I document proof of a professional visit to this P.T. department in TX so that I can deduct my air fare?