Eitan Neidich, Alon B. Neidich, David A. Axelrod, MD, and John P. Roberts, MD
Geographic disparities in availability of organs for transplant have spawned for-profit companies that help patients get on waitlists in more than one region and arrange travel for them if an organ becomes available.
The physician who offers telemedicine services to out-of-state patients is subject to the laws of his or her home state and the remote patient’s state, so it is crucial to understand both.
Margaret Little, PhD and Anne Drapkin Lyerly, MA, MD
Society is best served by an approach to conscience that combines a progressive understanding of patients’ needs, a nuanced determination of when those needs translate into claims, and a limited role for conscientious refusal.
Jody Steinauer, MD, MAS and Carolyn Sufrin, MD, MA
Legislative policies that require a physician to misrepresent the risks of abortion to patients and to show the patient an ultrasound and those that allow physicians not to provide referral for abortion create a conflict between the physician's obligations to the patient and to the law.
More anti-abortion legislation was passed in 2011 than in any other year since Roe v. Wade was decided in 1973. In the first half of the year, more than 80 abortion-related restrictions were enacted across the United States.
Fifty-seven percent of women in a recent large study did not want to view their ultrasounds before their abortions, suggesting that mandated viewing interferes with uncoerced consent to care, a hallmark of medical ethics.