Medical Ethics Advisor – May 1, 2011
May 1, 2011
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Can ethics and economics of healthcare share common ground?
Hospital ethics committees sometimes find they are drawn into local cases that reflect national debates over healthcare costs and policies. -
Palliative care model fits biomed ethics principles
Some of the core principles of medical ethics are patient determination, doing good for patients, and doing justice. These also are some of the chief attributes of palliative care, experts say. -
Responding to medical errors ethically
Hospital ethics committees need to review their hospitals' policies and approach to medical error reporting to determine whether or not the approach is a principled one, an expert says. -
Be aware of the culture of ethics consultations
Hospital ethics committees and consultants can improve their own understanding of cultural clashes between the institution and patients/families by first considering the culture inherent in an ethics consult. -
Improve dynamics of ethics consult meetings
Take a critical look at the dynamics of the ethics consult meeting in a debriefing, as a way to improve the process, an expert suggests. -
Group to study protection of humans
President Barack Obama has called for an investigation of U.S. human subjects research protections in response to last fall's disclosure that in the 1940s U.S. public health researchers deliberately infected Guatemalan research subjects with syphilis while testing penicillin. -
News Briefs: Where the nation stands with end-of-life care
The National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization (NHPCO) has published a report about end-of-life care, emphasizing the importance of more personal and private discussions about the topic.