A physician outlines the concept of the family covenant, an agreement between consenting family members that defines exactly how and when medical information is divulged to other family members.
An emerging medical ethics issue is whether to delay posting pathology reports to electronic health records (EHR) to allow clinicians time to follow up.
AMA J Ethics. 2016;18(8):826-832. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2016.18.8.pfor1-1608.
An ethical case explores genetic screening and whether or not sharing test results with patients only, and not other family members who may be at risk, is sufficient.
The AMA's Code of Medical Ethics' opinion on the use of databanks in genomic research requires informed consent by groups and individuals who are subjects of research.
Because maintaining strict confidentiality is often untenable, or even illegal, determining the extent of protections in the postmortem context ultimately entails a weighing of the various interests at stake.
Anne-Marie Laberge, MD, PhD and Wylie Burke, MD, PhD
Physicians and counselors must address the importance of communicating genetic test results to family members in the pre-test counseling and informed-consent processes prior to testing.
