Dr Matthew C. Bobel joins Ethics Talk to discuss his article, coauthored with Dr Robert K. Cleary: “How Should Risk Be Communicated to Patients When Developing Resident Surgeon Robotic Skills?”
Lydia Smeltz joins Ethics Talk to discuss her article, coauthored with Drs Susan M. Havercamp and Lisa Meeks: “Aspiring to Disability Consciousness in Health Professions Training.”
Support for the argument that preimplantation genetic diagnosis followed by selection and implantation of an embryo with a trait that many consider a disability, e.g., deafness, achondroplasia, does not harm the child that develops from the implanted embryo.
The ongoing anthrax vaccination case, Doe v Rumsfeld, tests whether the military can require participation in and punish refusal of a vaccination program while waiving informed consent.
The patient appears to have decision-making capacity, has head trauma, a headache despite intoxication, and is irritable—and she refuses a CT scan of the head.
Consent sounds like a laborious process that requires much time. Actually discussing a procedure or exam with a patient doesn’t take much more time than it took to read this paragraph.
An explanation of the legal origin of informed consent, the key court decisions in establishing the principle of consent to treatment, and the knowledge of risks and benefits necessary to “inform” the consent process adequately.
Specific advocate guidelines are needed for the protection of children in state custody who are potential research subjects in trials that would expose them to greater-than-minimal risk but also hold the prospect of direct benefit.
Physicians make patients aware of those interventions that they (the patients) may then refuse. In short, informed consent is less about patient decisions than it is about restraining physicians.
