Dr Art Walaszek joins Ethics Talk to discuss his article, coauthored with Drs William Smith and David Elkin: “How to Draw on Narrative to Mitigate Ageism.”
Refusal of pediatric euthanasia can be considered iatrogenic insofar as it inadvertently prolongs patient suffering, but attitudes differ cross-culturally.
AMA J Ethics. 2017;19(8):802-814. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2017.19.8.msoc1-1708.
When a medical student needs to be hospitalized, the paramount concern of the student affairs dean is promoting the student's health, followed by protecting her privacy and supporting her medical education.
When ventilator support is being withdrawn from a dying child, responsive titration of sedative medications by the ICU team can relieve suffering without anesthetizing the child completely or hastening death.
We should conduct empirical research to better understand how patients, parents, clinicians, and others grapple with the ethical challenges we confront when caring for children who are dying.