A pro and con argument for and against employing secret shoppers to evaluate a clinical practice environment.

Medicare will not pay for treatment of 8 preventable, hospital-acquired conditions (e.g., object left in place during surgery, catheter-associated urinary tract infection) that were not present when the patient was admitted.

ERISA, a piece of federal legislation passed in 1974 to protect pension funds and other retirement benefits, has been the source of much controversy and litigation concerning the liability of insurers in employer health benefit plans who deny coverage or reimbursements for specific medical treatments.

Medical schools should have formal curriculum on the laws and regulations that pertain to medical practice.

Dr. Jones has a duty to determine how the test results were lost and why, disclose this information to his patient, Mrs. Taylor, and see that she is not held responsible for the costs of rerunning the test.

A physician has an obligation to order necessary diagnostic tests for a patient on Medicaid with whom he or she has an established patient-physician relationship regardless of whether the cost of the necessary test will be reimbursed.

Systems impact patient care because doctors must balance what they think is medically optimal with the limits of the relevant systems in which they function.

A pro and con argument for and against employing secret shoppers to evaluate a clinical practice environment.

Quality improvement initiatives in clinical medicine are part research and part patient care and pose challenges to traditional forms of ethical oversight.

U.S. physicians have a duty to treat patients who receive organ transplants abroad and many believe that there are ways to reduce the shortage of organs for transplant in the U.S.