When patients are unable to express their wishes and do not have surrogates or advance directives, which and whose values should inform decision making for them? We discuss ethical complexities of caring for unrepresented patients.
Regularly scheduled dialysis is not standard of care for most undocumented immigrants in the United States, so preventative care, and advocacy for it, is needed.
AMA J Ethics. 2019; 21(1):E86-92. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2019.86.
A guardian’s request to sterilize a woman with intellectual disabilities is not ethically justifiable unless the woman assents and it is to her benefit.
AMA J Ethics. 2016; 18(4):365-372. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2016.18.4.ecas2-1604.
Efrat Lelkes, MD, Angira Patel, MD, MPH, Anna Joong, MD, and Jeffrey G. Gossett, MD
Current policy requires separate informed consent for some Public Health Service increased-risk donors, and this can make shared decision making harder.
AMA J Ethics. 2020; 22(5):E401-407. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2020.401.
Shared decision making honors patient autonomy, particularly for preference-sensitive care decisions and even when patients have impaired decision-making capacity.
AMA J Ethics. 2020; 22(5):E358-364. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2020.358.