Despite challenges of decision making for unrepresented patients, few laws or policy statements offer solutions. This article offers 5 key things to do.
AMA J Ethics. 2019;21(7):E582-586. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2019.582.
The law and medical ethics demand reconsideration of inflexible technical standards that are vulnerable to litigation under disability discrimination laws.
AMA J Ethics. 2016;18(10):1010-1016. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2016.18.10.hlaw1-1610.
Jennifer Aldrich, MD, Jessica Kant, MSW, LICSW, MPH, and Eric Gramszlo
Estelle v Gamble (1976) reiterates that the 8th Amendment to the US Constitution requires adequate care to be offered to all people who are incarcerated.
AMA J Ethics. 2023;25(6):E407-413. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2023.407.
Requirements for informed consent are relatively vague and the exceptions are few, so it is in the physician’s best interest to inform patients about proposed treatment options, ascertain that they understand their choices, and secure their consent.
Conflicts between federal and state laws governing marijuana, lack of evidence about its efficacy as a treatment, and physicians' inability to predict or control dosage would all be aided by reclassification of the drug that would let clinical research go forward.
Courts considering teenagers' refusal of life-saving treatments often consider their maturity, the beliefs underlying the refusal, their parents' wishes, and the chances that treatment would cure them.
It is unconstitutional--and unethical--for physicians to participate in evidence-gathering against pregnant women suspected of being addicted to illegal substances without informing them of their constitutional rights or gaining their informed consent.
An explanation of the legal origin of informed consent, the key court decisions in establishing the principle of consent to treatment, and the knowledge of risks and benefits necessary to “inform” the consent process adequately.
Article explains the right granted to state public health agencies by the Supreme Court in Jacobson v Massachusetts to mandate vaccination in the presence of actual or threatened danger to the health of its residents from infectious disease.