When a patient challenges the use of a reusable, stainless steel speculum rather than a plastic, throw-away one, the physician should educate her on the safety and environmental benefits of reusable medical devices.
Moral distress arises not only from organizational constraints on moral action but also from the environmental impacts of health care and climate change.
AMA J Ethics. 2017;19(6):617-628. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2017.19.6.mhst1-1706.
Climate is a primary determinant of whether a particular location has the environmental conditions suitable for the transmission of several vector-borne diseases, including dengue fever, St. Louis encephalitis, and West Nile virus.
When the health care industry came under the environmental microscope, the daily work of treating patients was discovered to be highly wasteful of natural and financial resources.
Carmen Black Parker, MD, Amanda Calhoun, MD, MPH, Ambrose H. Wong, MD, MSEd, Larry Davidson, PhD, and Charles Dike, MBChB, MPH
Psychiatric emergencies, coping stress reactions, and iatrogenic injuries are not responded to with the same vigor as acute medical decompensation. That needs to change.
AMA J Ethics. 2020;22(11):E956-964. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2020.956.
Dania Pagarkar joins Ethics Talk to discuss her article, coauthored with Drs Erin Harrop and Lisa Erlanger: “How Should We Approach Body Size Diversity in Clinical Trials?”