MedWorm: Medical Ethics

Subscription.

The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 20:42:11 +0100

Authors: PMID: 20223857 [PubMed - in process] (Source: The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy)

MedWorm Message: Get the very latest Swine Flu news via the MedWorm Swine Flu RSS news feed - updated hourly from thousands of authoritative health and news sources.

Editorial board.

The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 20:42:08 +0100

Authors: PMID: 20223858 [PubMed - in process] (Source: The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy)

Cover.

The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 20:42:04 +0100

Authors: PMID: 20223859 [PubMed - in process] (Source: The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy)

A new chapter…

Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 08:06:55 +0100

Content Type Journal ArticleCategory EditorialDOI 10.1007/s11019-010-9239-2Authors Bert Gordijn, Dublin City University Institute of Ethics, Henry Grattan Building Dublin 9 IrelandHenk ten Have, UNESCO Paris France Journal Medicine, Health Care and PhilosophyOnline ISSN 1572-8633Print ISSN 1386-7423 (Source: Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy)

Convergent ethical issues in HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria vaccine trials in Africa: Report from the WHO/UNAIDS African AIDS Vaccine Programme's Ethics, Law and Human Rights Collaborating Centre consultation, 10-11 February 2009, Durban, South Africa.

BMC Medical Ethics — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 00:00:00 +0100

Conclusion: The consultation revealed that while there have been few attempts to find convergence on ethical issues between HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria vaccine trial fields to date, there is much common ground and scope for convergence work between stakeholders in the three fields. (Source: BMC Medical Ethics)

Ethics briefings

Journal of Medical Ethics — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:01:39 +0100

(Source: Journal of Medical Ethics)

MedWorm Message: Get the very latest Swine Flu news via the MedWorm Swine Flu RSS news feed - updated hourly from thousands of authoritative health and news sources.

Body integrity identity disorder: response to Patrone

Journal of Medical Ethics — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:01:39 +0100

(Source: Journal of Medical Ethics)

Quality improvement in general practice: enabling general practitioners to judge ethical dilemmas

Journal of Medical Ethics — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:01:39 +0100

Quality improvement (QI) is fundamental to maintaining high standards of health care. Significant debate exists concerning the necessity for an ethical approval system for those QI projects that push the boundaries, appearing more similar to research than QI. The authors discuss this issue identifying the core ethical issues in family medicine (FM), drawing upon the fundamental principles of medical ethics, including principles of autonomy, utility, justice and non-maleficence. Recent debate concerning the application of QI ethics boards is discussed with relevance to primary care and issues such as general practitioner (GP) intentions, the impact of QI on patients and the use of confidential patient data and the impact of dissemination. The authors conclude that a system of QI ethical app...

Advance commitment: an alternative approach to the family veto problem in organ procurement

Journal of Medical Ethics — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:01:39 +0100

This article tackles the current deficit in the supply of cadaveric organs by addressing the family veto in organ donation. The authors believe that the family veto matters—ethically as well as practically—and that policies that completely disregard the views of the family in this decision are likely to be counterproductive. Instead, this paper proposes to engage directly with the most important reasons why families often object to the removal of the organs of a loved one who has signed up to the donor registry—notably a failure to understand fully and deliberate on the information and a reluctance to deal with this sort of decision at an emotionally distressing time. To accommodate these concerns it is proposed to separate radically the process of information, deliberati...

Assisted suicide by oxygen deprivation with helium at a Swiss right-to-die organisation

Journal of Medical Ethics — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:01:39 +0100

Conclusions The dying process of oxygen deprivation with helium is potentially quick and appears painless. It also bypasses the prescribing role of physicians, effectively demedicalising assisted suicide. Oxygen deprivation with a face mask is not acceptable because leaks are difficult to control and it may not eliminate rebreathing. These factors will extend time to unconsciousness and time to death. A hood method could reduce the problem of mask fit. With a hood, a flow rate of helium sufficient to provide continuous washout of expired gases would remedy problems observed with the mask. (Source: Journal of Medical Ethics)

Deprivation of liberty safeguards: how prepared are we?

Journal of Medical Ethics — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:01:39 +0100

We examined how many patients across a whole Trust area in Wales were subject to some lack of capacity, how well documented this was and how many were potentially deprived of their liberty. We found that no patient was deprived of their liberty, but 8% lacked capacity to make either basic or complex decisions; another 5% lacked capacity to make complex decisions. Documentation was good in mental health and community directorates, but there were gaps in documentation (not practice) in the medical and surgical directorates. Routine collection of data improved documentation regarding deprivation of liberty criteria. There is a high likelihood that senior nursing staff underestimate the number of patients who lack capacity. (Source: Journal of Medical Ethics)

MedWorm Message: Get the very latest Swine Flu news via the MedWorm Swine Flu RSS news feed - updated hourly from thousands of authoritative health and news sources.

Juridical and ethical peculiarities in doping policy

Journal of Medical Ethics — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:01:39 +0100

This article explores the arguments concerning the apparent legal peculiarities of antidoping legislation and their ethically salient features in terms of: notions of culpability, liability and guilt; aspects of potential duplication of punishments and the limitations of athlete privacy in antidoping practice and policy. It is noted that tensions still exist between legal and ethical principles and norms that require further critical attention. (Source: Journal of Medical Ethics)

Dignity: not such a useless concept

Journal of Medical Ethics — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:01:39 +0100

In her 2003 article in the British Medical Journal, Ruth Macklin provocatively declared dignity to be a useless concept: either a vague restatement of other more precise values, such as autonomy or respect for persons, or an empty slogan. A recent response to Macklin has challenged this claim. Doris Schroeder attempts to rescue dignity by positing four distinct concepts that fall under the one umbrella term. She argues that much of the confusion surrounding dignity is due to the lack of disambiguation among these four concepts, but that once we understand the different values in question dignity becomes a powerful tool in the fields of human rights and bioethics. It is the goal of this paper to build upon Schroeder's insights by reconnecting the multiple strands of dignity she identifies. ...

The cost of autonomy: estimates from recent advances in living donor kidney transplantation

Journal of Medical Ethics — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:01:39 +0100

Autonomy, an individual's right to make personal decisions regarding his/her own health, represents one of the major ethical principles of medicine. While there are many examples citing the benefits this right provides for the individual, the impact that personal healthcare decisions have on others is often neglected. Here, evidence from end-stage renal disease is reviewed to hypothesise the creation of a universal kidney donation programme that although provides unparalleled benefits to its citizens, relies on the participation of a large proportion of the society. Given that this essay also addresses the public's major concerns regarding kidney donation, one of the only remaining implementation barriers is the individuals' right not to participate. Therefore, irrespective of the humane a...

Sex rights for the disabled?

Journal of Medical Ethics — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:01:39 +0100

The public discourse surrounding sex and severe disability over the past 40 years has largely focused on protecting vulnerable populations from abuse. However, health professionals and activists are increasingly recognising the inherent sexuality of disabled persons and attempting to find ways to accommodate their intimacy needs. This essay explores several ethical issues arising from such efforts. (Source: Journal of Medical Ethics)

The perils of failing to enhance: a response to Persson and Savulescu

Journal of Medical Ethics — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:01:39 +0100

Ingmar Persson and Julian Savulescu argue that non-traditional forms of cognitive enhancement (those involving genetic engineering or pharmaceuticals) present a serious threat to humanity, since the fruits of such enhancement, accelerated scientific progress, will give the morally corrupt minority of humanity new and more effective ways to cause great harm. And yet it is scientific progress, accelerated by non-traditional cognitive enhancement, which could allow us to dramatically morally enhance human beings, thereby eliminating, or at least reducing, the threat from the morally corrupt minority. I argue that this apparently intractable dilemma is less difficult to resolve than Persson and Savulescu suppose. Their analysis of non-traditional cognitive enhancement overstates the risks and ...

MedWorm Message: Get the very latest Swine Flu news via the MedWorm Swine Flu RSS news feed - updated hourly from thousands of authoritative health and news sources.

Understanding risk in living donor nephrectomy

Journal of Medical Ethics — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:01:39 +0100

Conclusions Kidney donors will accept a higher risk of death than is currently quoted, especially if risks are presented in terms of chance of survival. (Source: Journal of Medical Ethics)

The ethics of basing community prevention in general practice

Journal of Medical Ethics — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:01:39 +0100

In this paper we argue that the responsibility for systematic community-based preventive medicine should not be made part of the role of the general practitioner (GP). Preventive medicine cannot be shown to be more effective than curative or supportive medicine. Therefore, the allocation of the large amount of general practice staff time and resources required for systematic preventive medicine should not come at the expense of the care of the sick and the suffering. The traditional healing role of the GP requires a cooperative patient-centred approach, whereas systematic preventive medicine is driven by rigid pre-set protocols and is intrinsically paternalistic. Trying to merge the two approaches is detrimental to the doctor-patient relationship. Furthermore, a number of potential pitfall...

Evolution of hospital clinical ethics committees in Canada

Journal of Medical Ethics — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:01:39 +0100

To investigate the current status of hospital clinical ethics committees (CEC) and how they have evolved in Canada over the past 20 years, this paper presents an overview of the findings from a 2008 survey and compares these findings with two previous Canadian surveys conducted in 1989 and 1984. All Canadian hospitals over 100 beds, of which at least some were acute care, were surveyed to determine the structure of CEC, how they function, the perceived achievements of these committees and opinions about areas with which CEC should be involved. The percentage of hospitals with CEC in our sample was found to be 85% compared with 58% and 18% in 1989 and 1984, respectively. The wide variation in the size of committees and the composition of their membership has continued. Meetings of CEC ...

Homeopathy is where the harm is: five unethical effects of funding unscientific 'remedies'

Journal of Medical Ethics — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:01:39 +0100

(Source: Journal of Medical Ethics)

The concise argument

Journal of Medical Ethics — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:01:39 +0100

(Source: Journal of Medical Ethics)

MedWorm Message: Get the very latest Swine Flu news via the MedWorm Swine Flu RSS news feed - updated hourly from thousands of authoritative health and news sources.

Genetic Testing, Conscientious Refusal of Medical Treatment to Children, and Organ Donation: An Introduction.

The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 00:00:00 +0100

Authors: Hinkley AE PMID: 20203138 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher] (Source: The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy)

Organ Donation by Capital Prisoners in China: Reflections in Confucian Ethics.

The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 00:00:00 +0100

This article discusses the practice and development of organ donation by capital prisoners in China. It analyzes the issue of informed consent regarding organ donation from capital prisoners in light of Confucian ethics and expounds the point that under the influence of Confucianism, China is a country that attaches great importance to the role of the family in practicing informed consent in various areas, the area of organ donation from capital prisoners included. It argues that a proper form of organ donation from capital prisoners can be justified within the Confucian moral context in which the proper interests of capital prisoners and their families, the benefit of organ receptors, and a rightful order of society should all be appropriately considered. From the Confucian perspective, t...

Government Intervention and The Nation's Diet: The Slippery Slope of Inaction.