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.
Paula Tironi, JD, LLM and Monique M. Karaganis, MD
While parents often have legal authority to make decisions regarding pediatric palliative care, federal and state statutory and case laws, like CAPTA, impose significant restrictions on that authority.
Even if they are not sick, people in quarantine are still patients; the physician is responsible for their well-being and may find that it is necessary to advocate for them.
The early diagnosis of Alzheimer disease is a boon in that it enables advance planning, but that planning process can engender conflict between respect for future-oriented autonomy and future welfare.
People with mental illness or a degenerative mental disease have special protections under the law when entering into contracts or other binding documents.
A review of a landmark case that determined why and under what circumstances antipsychotic medications can be administered to incarcerated patients with mental illness against their will.
Basic information about the two principal instruments used for assessing patients' decision-making competence and learn why both fall short of reliable, objective assessment.