Some question whether plastic surgeons bear responsibility for promoting suspect norms of beauty, given that certain types of cosmetic enhancements reinforce common conceptions of normality that are harmful to society.
Nancy Berlinger, PhD and Annalise Berlinger, BSN, RN
Physicians’ reliance on “culture” to explain patients’ noncompliance may serve as code for their discomfort with difference, uncertainty, and distress.
AMA J Ethics. 2017;19(6):608-616. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2017.19.6.msoc1-1706.
Tom Alsaigh, MD, Laura Nicholson, MD, PhD, and Eric Topol, MD
Clinicians should have a working understanding of gene editing, controversy surrounding its use, and its far-reaching clinical and ethical implications.
AMA J Ethics. 2019;21(12):E1089-1097. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2019.1089.
Despite drawbacks of immunosuppression and surgery, vascularized composite allotransplants can enhance lives of patients who meet candidacy criteria and are well supported.
AMA J Ethics. 2019;21(11):E968-973. doi:
10.1001/amajethics.2019.968.
Because regulatory approval of cognitive enhancement drugs is likely, physicians may want to consider whether they would condone the practice for restoration of function only or for enhancement purposes as well.
Quality improvement initiatives in clinical medicine are part research and part patient care and pose challenges to traditional forms of ethical oversight.
Immigrant patients are often bewildered when they need to seek health care in the U.S., and that care usually comes from physicians who are unsympathetic to their plight.