Clinical trials for the blood substitute PolyHeme exposed the possibility for ambiguous interpretation of the FDA’s waiver of informed consent for emergency research.
Unclear regulations and informal data gathering on immigrants who receive or donate organs can cause mistrust and suspicion of the organ allocation system and affect donation rates.
Immigrant patients are often bewildered when they need to seek health care in the U.S., and that care usually comes from physicians who are unsympathetic to their plight.
Physicians should go beyond basic medical diagnosis and treatment to offer support to families about the gamut of social and emotional issues that are involved with caring for a severely disabled child.
An undercurrent in all debates about allocation of health care resources to the poor is the matter of access to and coverage of health care for immigrants, particularly low-income and undocumented ones.