Two cases of physician failure to report possible child abuse that led to legal claims of malpractice and civil liability.

The arguments for mandatory vaccination with human papillomavirus vaccine differs from the justification for mandatory use of vaccines that protect against more easily transmitted diseases.

A brief history of public opposition to disease surveillance in the U.S., despite the documented success of this tool in recognizing and managing threats to public health.

State laws often require physicians to report suspected abuse and assault, creating a dilemma for physicians who must not only treat the injured patient but act as an informant to police.

When Hans Castorp, the protagonist in Thomas Mann’s Magic Mountain, receives a miniature X-ray print, he acquires a passport to what Susan Sontag describes as the “kingdom of the ill.” Hans knows he is ill because the X-ray declares it so, and his doctor merely shows him how to see the proof in the picture.

Each time an imaging study is ordered, radiologists must ask whether exposure to radiation is warranted. Imaging should not be performed to avoid litigation, for financial gain, to reach a quota, when the outcome clearly will not affect the treatment plan, or because the patient’s family demands it.

This case is challenging because it represents a potential error on the part of the radiologist who interpreted a previous film—not the doctor who is currently treating the patient. While standards are being developed to help doctors disclose their own errors, guidelines for discussing other doctors’ errors with patients are lacking.

Radiologists have a duty to report suspected child abuse and this duty is not satisfied by merely sharing these suspicions with the referring physician if that physician does not intend to follow up.

Variations among physicians in diagnosis and X-ray interpretation, the percentages of which have remained essentially unchanged for five decades, raise serious ethical concerns.

Explanation of the Medicare and Medicaid Antikickback statute and Stark Law and their restrictions on physicians' financial interests in ancillary services.