Treatment decisions in high-risk situations require a dynamic relationship between doctor and patient in which patient preferences and clinician recommendations contribute equally in shaping a final treatment decision.
Dr Anna L. Westermair joins Ethics Talk to discuss her article, coauthored with Dr Manuel Trachsel: “Moral Intuitions About Futility as Prompts for Evaluating Goals in Mental Health Care.”
Constraints on hospitalists and surgeons and restricted orthopedic admission criteria can exacerbate patients’ distress that comes from clinicians’ disagreements.
Victims of sexual violence who are minors should not be forced to submit to a rape kit exam against their wishes since it might retraumatize the patient.
Preventing bad outcomes for teens and their offspring was the impetus behind confidential care for reproductive health. Requiring parental involvement created an obstacle to the provision of necessary care.
Trauma-informed care ensures ethical treatment for children experiencing physical or psychological distress associated with a medical event or procedure.
The communication gulf is not only one of language, but also one of culture, understood broadly. And, despite the priority of medical concerns, every effort should be made to obtain consent consistent with appropriate care.
Fibromyalgia, with no positive tests, is a “foreigner” in the medical landscape. Medicine looks for signs of pathology, changes in the structure or function of organs. The mantra of physicians facing patients with fibromyalgia: “Your tests are normal.”
There is evidence that children who are unaware of their life-threatening diagnoses do not experience any less distress and anxiety than those who are told, and in some cases they may actually experience more.