When patients and physicians disagree on the use of genetic engineering technology, physicians must act in accordance with professional ethics and society's guidelines.
Genetic information is redefining what society and the medical profession considers to be normal and what departures from the norm are deserving of medical intervention.
A bioethicist who had thyroid cancer as a child describes his recent positive experience as an adult patient with his surgeon and how his surgeon's bioethics training helped the patient-physician relationship.