When a seriously ill mature minor and his parent disagree about his receiving an experimental intervention, who should decide what treatment he will receive?
While next-generation genome sequencing can successfully guide cancer therapy, it can also reveal significant incidental findings that patients, families, and physicians may not be prepared to handle and may not want to know.
Today's medical students have an important role in ethical care for the dying because their role involves having conversations with patients about their experiences and values.
Though there are channels through which terminally ill patients can access some experimental drugs that have not yet received FDA approval for marketing to the public, in general those drugs must already be proven safe and effective.
Despite leaps forward in medical technology that have enabled the timely detection and effective treatment of many cancers, members of marginalized racial and ethnic groups and patients without health insurance often do not receive timely and appropriate care.
In the interview Dr. DePinho discusses exciting research discoveries in cancer prevention and treatment and explains why a multidisciplinary approach to patient care is the best way to improve individuals' lives now and in the future.
This month theme issue editor, Trahern Jones, a fourth-year student at Mayo Medical School in Rochester, Minnesota, spoke with Dr. Edward Laskowski about the use of performance-enhancing drugs and substances among athletes today.
Prognostication means informing patients what the outcome of their illnesses and treatments are expected to be, based on the best available evidence. Prognosticating in a way that helps patients in decision making about treatment is difficult for physicians to do.