This month, AMA Journal of Ethics theme editor Jacquelyn Nestor, a fifth-year MD/PhD student at Hofstra-Northwell School of Medicine, interviewed Allen Buchanan, PhD, about how we can safely explore cutting-edge biomedical enhancements.
Because knowledge about the efficacy of long-term opioid use is lacking, decisions about opioid treatment for chronic nonmalignant pain should be guided by a six-step decision making process that is based in clinical ethics.
AMA J Ethics. 2015;17(6):521-529. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2015.17.6.nlit1-1506.
This month theme issue editor, Trahern Jones, a fourth-year student at Mayo Medical School in Rochester, Minnesota, spoke with Dr. Edward Laskowski about the use of performance-enhancing drugs and substances among athletes today.
Using evidence-based medical guidelines in courts will require confronting legal professionals' lack of training in assessing scientific evidence, the limitations of available evidence, and fundamental distinctions between the meaning of evidence in medicine and law.
Patients’ personal or cultural views toward illness, the business of health care under which we all operate, and our own personal opinions about the ideal of health and wellness can all compromise pain treatment. It is our responsibility to see that it does not.
The duty of forensic psychiatrists is to serve as objective experts to courts, but special circumstances in juvenile forensic evaluations and expectations about the patient-physician relationship may encourage confusion between the roles of forensic evaluator and treating psychiatrist.
Concerns about the deleterious effects of stress on the mind and body have led to the beginnings of a stress vaccine, an injection that will reduce these effects.
Arguments that mistrust about information security will deter patients from embracing telehealth care ignore patients' willingness to take on risk in the pursuit of health benefits and the role physicians will play in encouraging adoption.