AMA Journal of Ethics

How information is provided can change a choice. Decision science helps reveal affective forecasting errors and can generate choices congruent with patients’ and families’ values.

A graphic memoir documents clinical and ethical disagreements and decision points throughout a paramedic team’s time with an incarcerated patient in labor.

Current evidence suggests how hospice and palliative care clinicians can help advocate for high-quality, end-of-life care for patients with obesity.

Rather than relying on decision aids, values-based approaches to decision making illuminate a plurality of possible right actions.

Decision aids could help clinicians know when to request ethics consultation or re-evaluate blood product usage in a specific patient care situation.

Prognostic uncertainty about risk creates demand for ongoing communication and facilitated reflection about goals and values.

Selected ideas in C. Donald Combs and P. Ford Combs’ article, “Emerging Roles of Virtual Patients in the Age of AI,” are further considered.

Clarifying both patients’ and professionals’ values fosters good clinical decision making, particularly in situations of uncertainty.

The Body Issue is a graphic memoir exploring cultural and social influences on women’s self-conception and decisions.

Regulations’ negative influence on patient-physician relationships can be mitigated by innovation in decision science.