Despite the natural desire in obstetrics for a happy outcome, sometimes the common aggressive interventions will not help maintain a pregnancy until viability.
Julian Savulescu's writing on conscientious objection is guided by an emphasis on the principle of distributive justice that does not allow religion to have a special status as justification.
Amanda Fakih, MHSA and Kayte Spector-Bagdady, JD, MBE
Testing everyone for everything identifies more fetal conditions, but confusion persists about whether clinicians should leave screening decisions to patients.
AMA J Ethics. 2019;21(10):E858-864. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2019.858.
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.
Direct sterilization by means of tubal ligation is morally unacceptable in Catholic bioethics but other procedures that result in indirect sterilization may be acceptable under certain conditions.
Physicians need to carefully explain the difficult medical realities of carrying a fetus with severe congenital abnormalities to term but then follow the wishes of a religious family who ask for reasonable medical care.
Physicians need to carefully explain the difficult medical realities of carrying a fetus with severe congenital abnormalities to term but then follow the wishes of a religious family who ask for reasonable medical care.