Emergency medical consultations share with other emergencies the need for prompt action, potentially without information or tools ordinarily available.
AMA J Ethics. 2016;18(5):479-484. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2016.18.5.ecas1-1605.
When a severely ill child comes into the emergency room, assent for emergency care is no more required than is parental permission. Conveying the needed care is the top priority.
The practice of banking sperm from adolescents about to undergo chemotherapy is not universal, which lends support to the argument that parental consent be required for the intervention.
Our ability to infer mental states from fMRI scans is still rudimentary, but the time may be approaching when neuroimaging can be used to indicate witnesses’ reliability in court proceedings.