Clinical equipoise—the idea that the community of medical experts is uncertain about the relative therapeutic merits of the arms of a clinical trial at its outset—mitigates physicians’ responsibility for patients’ poor outcomes when patients are assigned to the control arm or are harmed by an investigational agent.
AMA J Ethics. 2015;17(12):1108-1115. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2015.17.12.ecas1-1512.
Timothy Cavanaugh, MD, Ruben Hopwood, MDiv, PhD, and Cei Lambert, MFA
The informed consent model for gender-affirming medical treatment emphasizes patient autonomy in choosing care without involving mental health professionals.
AMA J Ethics. 2016;18(11):1147-1155. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2016.18.11.sect1-1611.
This month, AMA Journal of Ethics' theme editor Cameron Waldman, a second-year medical student at Albany Medical College, interviewed Aron Janssen, MD, about how healthcare professionals can better serve their transgender patients.
The experience of an English professor dying of ovarian cancer in Margaret Edson’s play Wit shows that both literary and medical discourse obfuscate and objectify rather than promote communication of “simple human truths” that dignify life and death.
AMA J Ethics. 2015;17(9):858-864. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2015.17.9.imhl1-1509.
When a seriously ill mature minor and his parent disagree about his receiving an experimental intervention, who should decide what treatment he will receive?
The revisions balance a growing understanding of gender identity disorders and societal views with the need to retain conditions that benefit from intervention and the removal of which would hamper patients’ ability to receive medical treatment.
Elizabeth Lee Daugherty, MD, MPH and Douglas B. White, MD, MA
Opportunities to advance scientific knowledge may arise during humanitarian crises, but their presence does not justify suspension of the ethical foundations governing human subjects research.
Patricia D. Quigley, MD and Megan A. Moreno, MD, MSEd, MPH
Maintaining an adolescent’s confidentiality while answering his or her parents’ questions about their child’s change in mood and behavior can be challenging.
Loss of personal integrity, the emotional and psychological costs of “pronoun switching,” and actively managing one’s presentation can be time-consuming and exhausting.
The profession of medicine is duty-bound to further the best interests of the public. If evidence suggests that discrimination based on sexual orientation or denial of civil marriage to GLBT couples has adverse effects on their health, physicians must oppose such practices, regardless of their personal biases.