Medical Ethics Advisor – December 1, 2024
December 1, 2024
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Ethics Consult Requestors Validate Value of Ethicists, Voice Concerns About Access
What is the value of an ethics consultation? Clinical areas rely on hard data, such as an increase in the percentage of patients receiving medication in a specific timeframe, to demonstrate quality. For ethics, a “good” consult is much harder to define and is talked about in terms of qualitative, rather than quantitative, data.
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Pediatric Ethics Consults Differ in the Outpatient vs. Inpatient Setting
When consulting on pediatric cases in the outpatient setting, ethicists see distinct issues compared to the inpatient setting, a recent study found.
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Physician Selling Practice? Ethical Guidance Is Needed
As healthcare in America continues to consolidate, private independent practices or solo practitioners are fewer in number. A growing number of physicians are selling their practices to private equity firms or other buyers, raising ethical concerns.
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Rise of Private Equity Raises Ethical Conflicts in Emergency Medicine
In emergency medicine, there are growing ethical concerns that the role of private equity firms is putting profits above patient care.
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Unique Ethical Concerns with AI-Enabled Cardiovascular Care
Multiple artificial intelligence (AI) -based cardiovascular devices are currently being developed and evaluated. In a recent study, researchers sought to identify specific barriers and facilitators to trustworthy and ethical use of AI in cardiovascular care.
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Ethical Considerations for Validating AI Tools in Clinical Trials
With the growing integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into healthcare, there is a need to validate AI applications through rigorous clinical trials.
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Ethics Expertise Needed for Validation of AI Tools
Shaun Grannis, MD, MS, vice president for data and analytics at Regenstrief Institute and a professor of family medicine at the Indiana University School of Medicine, speaks with Medical Ethics Advisor about ethical issues involved with evaluating artificial intelligence tools.
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Facilitated Ethics Conversations Are Tools to Address Moral Distress
Ethicists often help nurses and other clinicians to identify and address moral distress during ethics consults. However, ethicists struggle to identify the most effective approaches. Lucia Wocial, PhD, FAAN, RN, HEC-C, and colleagues conducted a study to determine the effect of a two-phased moral stress intervention.
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Ethical Concerns with Data Sharing Practices of Healthcare Organizations
It is not uncommon for hospitals to share patient data with technology companies, either to spur research and product development or to train artificial intelligence models designed to improve clinical decision making. Researchers interviewed and surveyed 24 informatics leaders about current data sharing practices at their institutions.
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Gap in End-of-Life Care in Rural Areas Is an Ethical Concern
Rural hospices have limited resources and lower Medicare reimbursement rates compared to their urban counterparts. These challenges result in disparities in end-of-life care.
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Ethical Considerations with DNR Orders and Anesthesia Care
Because many elements of anesthesia care constitute “resuscitation” in other settings, patients presenting for surgery with do-not-resuscitate orders or other directives limiting treatment pose some unique ethical challenges.
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Ethicists Can Ensure Goals of Care Discussions Happen Earlier
Goals of care discussions are known to reduce invasive interventions and align patient care with patient values, but conversations often occur shortly before death.