Clinical case examines physicians’ duties and risks during an epidemic. Commentaries address physician’s rights vs patients’ rights. Does the duty to treat always override personal or family concerns?
Physicians should seriously weigh the benefits and risks involved prior to discussing the possibility of genetic testing with a patient or referring them to a genetic counselor.
A physician attorney argues that the best way to ensure that physicians don't refuse to treat patients is to create a system in which their medical education is fully funded and they must repay a debt to society.
Physicians and surrogates should take patients' preferences into account in making clinical intervention decisions, even if the patients have been found to lack decision-making capacity.
Physicians and surrogates should take patients' preferences into account in making clinical intervention decisions, even if the patients have been found to lack decision-making capacity.
A landmark court case in California determined that a competent adult patient has the right to forgo medical treatment and the patient's autonomy supersedes the state's interest in preserving the patient's life.
Physicians and surrogates should take patients' preferences into account in making clinical intervention decisions, even if the patients have been found to lack decision-making capacity.
Nonlegal, judicial, and statutory courses of action are available to patient surrogates and physicians who cannot agree on withdrawal of life-sustaining treatment.
When evaluating the developments and complications of a marginally viable premature infant, physicians and parents must work together to decide on treatment that is in the infant’s best interest.