Annette Hanson, MD, Ron Pies, MD, and Mark Komrad, MD
Authors respond to “How Should Physicians Care for Dying Patients with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis?” by arguing that patients’ motives for accessing death with dignity laws should be thoroughly explored and that temporarily limiting patient autonomy can promote well-being at the end of life.
AMA J Ethics. 2018;20(11):E1107-1109. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2018.1107.
Alexander Craig, MPhil and Elizabeth Dzeng, MD, PhD, MPH
Responding to “Added Points of Concern about Caring for Dying Patients,” authors argue that physicians’ refusal to prescribe lethal drugs in accordance with states’ death with dignity laws could damage patient-physician relationships and harm patients.
AMA J Ethics. 2018;20(11):E1110-1112. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2018.1110.
Undocumented patients in the United States with end-stage renal disease receive “compassionate” dialysis. Such patients oscillate between being marginally well and “ill enough” to receive dialysis while clinicians wrestle with complicity in a system that both offers and withholds life-saving therapy.
AMA J Ethics. 2018;20(8):E778-779. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2018.778.
A portrait illuminates a metaphor for maldistribution of burden of disease, risk exposure, and long-standing inequity in health laid bare to the world during the COVID-19 pandemic.
AMA J Ethics. 2021;23(3):E283-284. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2021.283.
American visual and narrative representations of Native experiences suggest an obligation to look on 19th-century White American artists’ romanticizations of those experiences with humility.
AMA J Ethics. 2020;22(10):E898-903. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2020.898.
Forced migration of Pacific Islanders raises ethical issues of health and health care disparities, which are examined in the case of Tuvaluan immigrants.
AMA J Ethics. 2017;19(12):1211-1221. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2017.19.12.imhl1-1712.
The case of Nancy Cruzan, a 25-year-old woman whose injuries from an automobile accident resulted in a persistent vegetative state, helped to empower people with end-of-life choices.