This case illustrates how emergency physicians find themselves with an empty toolbox and must compromise to meet their responsibilities to patients and themselves.
Advance directives do not always resolve questions about the best care for patients who no longer have decision-making capacity; physicians and patient surrogates can take alternative approaches to arrive at the best care decision.
Physicians of patients who request physician-assisted suicide should not avoid the subject and should try to discuss the patients' specific concerns and fears with them.
A new AMA policy provide guidance for physician-scientists on dual-use research issues and reinforces the message that ethical conduct in scientific research ultimately rests with the individual researcher.
William E. Novotny, MD and Ronald M. Perkin, MD, MA
Physicians need to understand the resources available to them to serve the sometimes conflicting needs of the pediatric patients' best interest and the religious beliefs of the patients' parents.
Physicians need to understand the resources available to them to serve the sometimes conflicting needs of the pediatric patients' best interest and the religious beliefs of the patients' parents.