Medical Ethics Advisor – December 1, 2014
December 1, 2014
View Issues
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Ebola spotlights growing tension between patient autonomy and public health
Should cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) be given to end-stage Ebola patients, despite the risk to health care providers? What training is necessary at this point to ensure staff and patients are protected? -
ACA shifts liability to patients: Bioethicists must be "watchdogs" to ensure ethical care
The ethical justification for the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is distributive justice, with the goal of making health insurance available to more Americans, notes Dennis M. Sullivan, MD, director of the Center for Bioethics at Cedarville (OH) University -
Providers need reminder: End-of-life decisions aren’t only up to patient and family
At the University of Missouri School of Medicine in Columbia, MO, about 80% of ethics consults are called for patients who are either dying or near death in the critical care setting, estimates David A. Fleming, MD, MA, FACP, professor of medicine, chairman of the Department of Medicine and director of the Center for Health Ethics. -
Undocumented patients face unique ethical concerns with end-of-life care
In one sense, undocumented patients are like any other patients some have health insurance, but many will not. Whats particularly challenging is that undocumented patients who are uninsured will usually not qualify for the safety net programs that provide assistance for similar patients with citizenship, says Mark Kuczewski, PhD, chair of the Department of Medical Education and director of the Neiswanger Institute for Bioethics at Loyola University in Maywood, IL. -
Patients need guidance when sharing genetic screening results: Consider ethics
A patient came for a consult for a prophylactic bilateral salpingoopherectomy the removal of fallopian tubes and ovaries because of a strong maternal family history of breast cancer. -
Research participants’ social media use can compromise study’s validity
Blogs, message boards, and patient communities are being used not only by patients, but also by research participants. In some cases, this reveals whether or not a participant is taking actual medication or placebos, compromising the studys validity.