Physicians face a conflict between desiring to cure a patient of his or her psychiatric illness and recognizing that the cure will take away from the patient's purpose in life.
Physicians need to understand the need for clarity and rigor in defining spirituality in research and practice to bring spirituality into the practice of health care.
Volk v DeMeerleer may conflict with professional guidelines regarding physicians’ obligations to breach patient confidentiality to protect third parties.
AMA J Ethics. 2018;20(1):10-18. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2018.20.1.peer2-1801.
Developing technologies for personalized medicine may be misused to popularize the idea that one can infer a person’s genetic makeup from observer-defined or self-reported assignment to a race or ethnic group.
Amy Barnhorst, MD, Garen Wintemute, MD, MPH, and Marian E. Betz, MD, MPH
When mandatory reporting of risk of violence is not required, physicians should balance patient autonomy and beneficence with patient and public safety.
AMA J Ethics. 2018;20(1):29-35. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2018.20.1.ecas1-1801.
An attempt to investigate correlations between race, attitudes, and contraceptive use did not find meaningful associations between race and attitudes about birth control or pregnancy that could influence contraceptive choice.
PSOs are not required to share their data, which limits the ability to achieve a much-needed national perspective. Regardless, the are a step in the right direction.