The early diagnosis of Alzheimer disease is a boon in that it enables advance planning, but that planning process can engender conflict between respect for future-oriented autonomy and future welfare.
A consensus has emerged that the paternalism behind use of the provocative saline infusion test for nonepileptic seizures cannot be justified because the harms to the patient, the physician, and their relationship exceed the benefits.
A discussion of the ethical issues raised by a patient’s request for off-label, prophylactic bariatric surgery to prevent diabetes mellitus type 2 (DM type 2).
Does a surgeon’s complication rate in a randomized controlled trial constitute a “significant new finding” that must be reported to patients during the consent process?
Good ethics and good business don’t have to be in conflict. Ophthalmologists shouldn’t resort to requiring their patients to buy contact lenses in-house; instead, they should focus on expanding their skill set and providing personalized service.
Physicians’ ethical obligations to disclose conflicts of interest to patients and to obtain their informed consent for treatment are particularly critical when proposed treatments are experimental.
Richard L. Kravitz, MD, MSPH and Jodi Halpern, MD, PhD
Patients have a responsibility to discerningly present the drug information they receive from direct-to-consumer advertising and to be active partners with their physician in making health care decisions.