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Medical Ethics Advisor

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  • USCCB: "Deficiencies" in conscience protections

    The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) Secretariat of Pro-Life Activities, Richard Doerflinger, suggests that following the passage of health care reform, "there's still a number of deficiencies in conscience protection."
  • Behavioral health groups applaud Joint Commission

    Four founding partners in a public-private collaboration to advance performance measurement in behavioral health on July 21 applauded The Joint Commission's (TJC) announcement of the next phase of the "Hospital-Based Inpatient Psychiatric Hospitals" (HBIPS) core measures initiative.
  • NHPCO offers position statement on palliative sedation

    Palliative care refers to patient- and family-centered care that optimizes quality of life by anticipating, preventing, and treating suffering. Palliative care throughout the continuum of illness involves addressing physical, intellectual, emotional, social, and spiritual needs and facilitating patient autonomy, access to information, and choice.
  • QI initiatives and ethical oversight

    In light of "substantial attention in both professional and popular literature" regarding ethical oversight of quality improvement initiatives, researchers at Johns Hopkins University sought systematic data on this topic and they believe that's what they found.
  • Family care physicians and DSM-5

    The chair of the task force responsible for the fifth edition of Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, David J. Kupfer, MD, and Darrel A. Regier, co-authors of a recent commentary in JAMA, suggested their perspective in the commentary title: "Why All of Medicine Should Care About DMS-5."
  • Informed consent nightmares

    Sue Dill Calloway, RN, Esq., BSN, MSN, JD, a nurse attorney and medical legal consultant in Columbus, OH,has had considerable experience in dealing with informed consent. Calloway recently presented an audio conference on "Informed Consent 2010: The Latest in CMS and Joint Commission Consent Requirements" for AHC Media, publisher of Medical Ethics Advisor.
  • Hospice treats physical, emotional suffering

    "I think most of us who take care of patients didn't get a very good education in excellent symptom management, so [many] people don't know how to take care of pain and dyspnea and anxiety and delirium and all these symptoms that truly, truly cause physical suffering," Mahon tells Medical Ethics Advisor.
  • News Briefs

    In a May 20 letter to Congress, the chairman of the U.S. Bishops' Committee on Pro-Life Activities called on Congress to remedy what he characterized asthe abortion and conscience flaws in the Patient Protection and Affordable Act (PPACA), according to a news release from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops in Washington, DC.
  • News Briefs: NQF endorses measures in psychiatric care

    The National Quality Forum (NQF) has endorsed two inpatient psychiatric measures focused on quality improvement in psychiatric hospitals and general hospitals with psychiatric units.
  • Academic centers provide education, resources to colleagues

    Smaller, community-based hospitals may face many of the same types of patient cases that require ethical decision-making; however, these hospitals often have fewer resources than large urban or academic centers with which to receive training in this area.