AMA Journal of Ethics theme editor Renee Mao, a third-year medical student at the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences, interviewed Dr. Tarris Rosell, PhD, DMin, MDiv, about strategies for incorporating spiritual care into oncology.

If a patient’s feelings become sources of resistance to treatment, clinicians need to know how to address these feelings’ influence on the therapeutic capacity of patient-clinician relationships.

Decision-making capacity can be preserved in patients with mental illness and should be formally assessed in the context of their values and past decisions.

Clinical trials should assess patients’ distress and test interventions to address it, just as they assess adverse events and test novel therapeutic agents.

Physicians’ perceptions of “difficult” encounters are related to perceived workload, job satisfaction, and communication training, similar to burnout.

When colleagues request treatment that is not medically indicated, clinicians should show empathy and respect without compromising judgment.

Expectations implicit in medical school funding and professional socialization lead underrepresented minorities to work with underserved populations.

Procedures for weighing factual evidence could help avoid the epistemic injustice of discounting or ignoring the voices of clinical research subjects.

Clinicians can be patient advocates, resource stewards, and promote good financial choices about care.

The DSM-5 Task Force’s handling of the ethical controversy over the bereavement exclusion demonstrates the need for more inclusive deliberative processes.