Death’s legal definition must be responsive to advances in technology, and it must delineate between life and death. Knowing where to draw the line is difficult.
AMA J Ethics. 2020;22(12):E1055-1061. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2020.1055.
Dr Ariane Lewis discusses how we can navigate uncertainty and ambiguity about brain death by understanding clinical criteria for brain death determination and how our approaches to death are culturally and socially situated.
As high-tech care decisions led to value clashes in hospital corridors, ethics committees developed to respond to diverse viewpoints, families’ concerns, and clinicians’ moral distress. They now exist in almost all US health care organizations.
AMA J Ethics. 2016;18(5):546-553. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2016.18.5.mhst1-1605.
A physician explains that the sale of nonprescription cosmeceuticals from a dermatology office should be done in a manner that is educational but non-threatening to patients.
A physician and a lawyer argue against a dermatology clinic switching from a small, reliable pathology lab to a large-scale pathology lab in order to receive volume discounts and increase profit.