James Mills Jr., MD, a founder of emergency medicine, believed he could have greater impact on medical care for the poor in his city by giving up his practice and working in the emergency room full time.
The federal requirement for providing emergency medical care to those who cannot pay has been unsuccessful in eliminating refusal of care and the practice of “patient dumping.”
An argument that the concept of judicious dissent can resolve the debate over a physician’s conscience-based right to refuse to provide lawful services.
An argument that an individual physician’s conscience-based decision not to offer specific, lawful medical services should not restrict patients’ access to those services.
With good planning and good will, medical professionals’ right of conscience and patients’ rights to controversial services can be both protected and accommodated.
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.