A history of device oversight by the US Food and Drug Administration traces regulatory changes in response to injuries caused by Dalkon Shield intrauterine devices.
AMA J Ethics. 2021;23(9):E712-720. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2021.712.
Joel T. Wu, JD, MPH, MA and Jennifer B. McCormick, PhD, MPP
False health-related speech can cause harm, but it’s not restricted unless it’s obscene. Physicians are obliged not only to correct patients’ false beliefs, but to engage digital spaces in which false claims thrive.
AMA J Ethics. 2018;20(11):E1052-1058. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2018.1052.
Government can regulate false speech and professional speech, which bans “gag laws” and compelled speech about laws to restrict abortion, for example. How should health professions share regulatory responsibility with government to prevent true speech about health information from being stifled?
AMA J Ethics. 2018;20(11):E1041-1048. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2018.1041.
The social institutions of medicine and the state have a complex history of interaction in which doctors have been the originators of political ideals, goals, and social change but equally often have found themselves to be instruments of political authority.
In the iconic painting Broken Column, Kahlo represents her spine as a Greek column that is fractured and disintegrating. In this beautiful and tragic interpretation, the fractured column bespeaks Kahlo’s physical weakness and emotional instability.
Federal regulations governing egg donation fall into two categories: safety testing and truth in advertising. Neither deals directly with informed consent by, for example, specifying what information donors must be given.
Fifty-seven percent of women in a recent large study did not want to view their ultrasounds before their abortions, suggesting that mandated viewing interferes with uncoerced consent to care, a hallmark of medical ethics.