A physician in a university student health center may feel a duty to intervene when he finds out from a patient that a student who is not a patient is diverting medication, but doing so would violate patient confidentiality.
Jessie Kimbrough-Sugick, MD, MPH, Jessica Holzer, MA, and Eric B. Bass, MD, MPH
Researchers who approach community partners with an agenda already in hand are missing the point of the community-based participatory research enterprise: developing priorities for study together.
By privileging traditional research methods in forms for research protocol approval, IRBs can unknowingly allow community partners to be harmed in CBPR. Changes to the language can help ensure appropriate sensitivity and community involvement.
Susanne Sheehy, BM BCh, MRCP, DTM&H and Joel Meyer, BM BCh, MRCP
The decline in numbers of healthy volunteers who participate in clinical trials has the potential to become a key rate-limiting factor in vaccine development.
Disparities in children’s mental health care could be addressed through expansion of school-based programs via passage of the Mental Health in Schools Act.
AMA J Ethics. 2016;18(12):1218-1224. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2016.18.12.pfor1-1612.
B. Rashmi Borah, Nicolle K. Strand, JD, MBioethics, and Kata L. Chillag, PhD
The Bioethics Commission’s recommendations to include research participants with impaired consent capacity provide an ethical foundation for neuroscience.
AMA J Ethics. 2016;18(12):1192-1198. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2016.18.12.nlit1-1612.
Efforts are underway to make posttraumatic stress disorder a condition for which the Veterans Administration will authorize coverage for use of service dogs.
AMA J Ethics. 2015;17(6):547-552. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2015.17.6.hlaw1-1506.
The AMA Code of Medical Ethics' opinion on adolescent care affirms competent minors' right to confidentiality except in situations for which confidentiality for adults may be breached.
There are numerous state and federal laws designed to protect against misuse and diversion of prescription drugs that apply to patients' behavior, physicians' prescribing practices, and dispensing.