Dr Ariane Lewis discusses how we can navigate uncertainty and ambiguity about brain death by understanding clinical criteria for brain death determination and how our approaches to death are culturally and socially situated.
As high-tech care decisions led to value clashes in hospital corridors, ethics committees developed to respond to diverse viewpoints, families’ concerns, and clinicians’ moral distress. They now exist in almost all US health care organizations.
AMA J Ethics. 2016;18(5):546-553. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2016.18.5.mhst1-1605.
Patients can now easily view their health records, so clinicians must consider a reader’s interpretation of how they convey sensitive personal health information. What might this mean for ethics consultants?
AMA J Ethics. 2020;22(9):E784-791. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2020.784.