Daniella M. Schocken, Aliye Runyan, MD, Anna Willieme, MFS, and Jason Wilson, MD
Distinctions in garb worn by health care professionals have their drawbacks, to the degree that reinforcing the differences between team members can reinforce rigid role divisions and hierarchical inequities that undermine teamwork.
Having implied that a particular clinical decision had been made to “free up a hospital bed,” the attending physician walked away without further comments to the residents or talking with the patient.
The greatest pressure to resuscitate the extremely low-birth-weight infant often results from successful marketing efforts that lead families to expect that their premature infants will be cute and healthy.
Physicians new to a case might object to an established care plan. Practice variation, clinical momentum, and how value is assigned by different parties to acute care and comfort measures can each contribute to conflict in these cases.
Pathologists should work cooperatively with clinicians and provide guidance about appropriate testing to uphold the medical ethics principle of justice.
The authors address the medical ethics question of whether autopsy is necessary from Cartesian and sociocultural perspectives and how to obtain consent.
Patient safety is a medical ethics issue that must be addressed through health care teams’ open communication as well as through time-outs and checklists.