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The Institute of Medicine (IOM) in 2002 issued a report, Unequal Treatment: Confronting Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Healthcare, that concludes that bias, prejudice, and stereotyping on the part of health care providers may result in differences in care.
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A man whose familys high-profile and successful campaign to solicit a donated liver to save his life has died, eight months after the transplant.
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The physician who first described the persistent vegetative state (PVS) watched in deep dismay at the struggle over the fate of perhaps the most famous PVS patient, Terri Schiavo.
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Some conflicts among families of terminally ill patients or patients in vegetative states cannot be resolved, says an expert in doctor-patient communications, but much can be done before the conflict rises to the level of that in the family of Terri Schiavo.
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Patients who are noncompliant, unpleasant, or troublesome give physicians frequent opportunities to consider terminating their physician-patient relationships.
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While Catholic clergy were perhaps the most vocal religious voices during the controversy over Terri Schiavos life and death, all major religions emphasize the preservation of life. Where standpoints vary, even within religions, is on the question of how long to prolong life.
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As a 26-year-old woman, Terri Schiavo likely never imagined she would abruptly fall into a vegetative state that would put decisions about her health care into the courts and the public eye for a decade. But simply assuming that an advance directive or living will would have prevented the family battles that raged over the decision to withdraw the artificial nutrition keeping her alive might be misguided, experts say.
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Since passage of the Patient Self-Determination Act (PSDA) in 1990, the living will a form of advance directive that spells out the signers wishes for end-of-life care and termination of care has become an almost automatic subject in any discussion of death or resuscitative medicine. But is the living will the useful tool that polls indicate most Americans believe it is?
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Living Will, Health care power of attorney, and Health care advance directive are defined.
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Critics call his practice boutique medicine or wealthcare, but the way Michigan physician John Blanchard, MD sees it, he and his partners at Premier Private Physicians are putting control of health care back in the hands of their patients.