The anatomy professor indoctrinates all students to respect the dignity of the dead person—the corpse has to be treated with reverence and deference. The informed consent is the zenith of such dogma. So, what exactly is it?
It is a process of communication between a clinician and a patient that results in the patient's authorization or agreement to undergo a specific medical intervention. Hence, informed consent protects both the clinician and the patient. There are many sites on the internet giving advice to clinicians on how to improve and obtain good communication with the patient. The dialog of informed consent is used in both clinical and research settings.
This process of informed consent may occur within one encounter or across multiple encounters. Stating alternatives to the suggested treatment including the option of no treatment. Stating risks and benefits of the suggested treatment and comparing them to the risks and benefits of alternatives.
Eliciting the patient's preference and thereby consent. Less serious risks need to be specified if they occur more commonly. Informed consent was first used in court by the late attorney Paul G.
Gebhard in a medical malpractice suit, Salgo v Leland Jr. This case involved a patient named Martin Salgo who awoke paralyzed after aortography, having never been informed that such a risk existed.
The defense argued that the doctor had been negligent in not warning Salgo that there was a risk of paralysis. It enabled patients to participate in their health care. Respect for the patient's right of self-determination on a particular therapy demands a standard set by law for physicians rather than one which physicians may or may not impose upon themselves. It is unthinkable nowadays to perform a medical procedure without a signed consent by the patient.
Clinicians are required to inform patients what the procedure is all about as well as explain its potential risks. The notion of informed consent is relatively recent. To achieve a cure, it was widely felt that authority must be coupled with obedience. Thus, it was deemed necessary that physicians make decisions for patients. This has been the old-style thinking in medicine, but this concept has changed with the advent of informed consent.
Physicians felt that any disclosure of possible difficulties might erode patient trust. However, physicians are now required to disclose to the patient what the risks and adverse effects of a contemplated procedure or treatment plan. For thousands of years, the medical profession has regulated its conduct through the Oath of Hippocrates , a body of ethical statements developed primarily for the benefit of the patient.
The oath has historically guided physician's professional conduct. As a member of this profession, a physician must recognize responsibility to patients first and foremost, as well as to the society, to other health professionals, and to self.
Physicians are respected for their knowledge and moral standing. New physicians take the Oath of Hippocrates which was adopted by the medical profession as a guide of professional conduct through the centuries.
It is still being used today in graduation ceremonies of many medical schools. The oath was written over years ago. Although the oath bears the name of Hippocrates, there is no evidence that he wrote it.
It is claimed that it was written years after his death. No one knows who wrote it. In , a German medical school University of Wittenberg incorporated taking the oath for its graduating medical students. However, it was not until the s, when the document was translated into English that Western medical schools began regularly incorporating the oath in convocations. In its original form, the oath requires a new physician to swear, by a number of healing Gods, to uphold specific ethical standards.
Physicians breathed the oath in their daily life: Treat the sick to the best of one's ability, preserve patient privacy, teach one's knowledge of medicine to the next generation, etc. These are lofty ideals. These prohibitions make it clear that the physician is surrounded with certain moral standards which take precedence over the individual physician's judgment. There are two versions of the oath — classical and modern. These are reproduced here for comparison. The classical version of the oath is outdated.
Most graduating medical school students swear to a modern version. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, It appears in many websites. Undoubtedly, there are many modern ethical issues today that did not exist in the past, such as abortion and euthanasia. The pros and cons of these two topics dominate our world today. Most physicians take the oath upon graduation from medical school. Is the oath still relevant?
There are many ethical issues in medicine which cannot be resolved or mediated by signing a consent form alone or swearing to an oath. The ethical landscape has changed.
Physicians are faced with a lot of tough ethical issues that never existed in the past. The oath has generated a lot of controversies, with some claiming that the oath is a meaningless relic of a distant past as it does not address the realities of modern medicine such as abortion, physician-assisted killing which falls under the broad term euthanasia , and end-of-life issues.
It is felt that the oath offers no guidance to the ethical dilemmas in today's medical practice. Many updated versions of the Hippocratic Oath have been published which use many basic principles of the original, which medical students commonly swear to upon graduation.
It requires a new physician to swear upon a number of healing gods that he will uphold a number of professional ethical standards. And you still have to pay your bills, complete your CEs, and maintain the legal and ethical obligations of the profession.
As a licensed therapist, I took no oath when I received my license to practice. Professional mental health therapists swear nothing. One such alternative: the Nightingale pledge, a document written in and named in honor of the founder of modern nursing, Florence Nightingale. Core nursing values essential to baccalaureate education include human dignity, integrity, autonomy, altruism, and social justice. The Code of Ethics for Nurses consists of two components: the provisions and the accompanying interpretive statements.
There are nine provisions that contain an intrinsic relational motif: nurse to patient, nurse to nurse, nurse to self, nurse to others, nurse to profession, and nurse and nursing to society.
Unethical Behavior Among Individuals Lying to your spouse about how much money you spent. Lying to your parents about where you were for the evening. Stealing money from the petty cash drawer at work. Lying on your resume in order to get a job. Begin typing your search term above and press enter to search. By , it had been incorporated into the graduation ceremony of the medical school in Montpellier, France.
The restrictive, ancient vow poses several problems for the modern practitioner. First, the oath forbids physician use of a knife, a key instrument involved in nearly every medical practice.
Second, its prohibition against abortion violates U. Third, its restraint on euthanasia runs counter to the modern trend toward physician-assisted suicide. Fourth, who swears to Apollo anymore, let alone the much lesser known Asclepius, Hygieia and Panacea? Fifth, many doctors treat, or at least give medical advice to, those close to them, including spouses and sexual partners, which is prohibited by the oath.
Sixth, the oath is potentially a binding contract, which, in our litigation-heavy society, could provide a dissatisfied patient with yet another avenue to sue her doctor. Contrarily, when someone sues for a breach of contract, they often have a longer time period in which to sue.
Although most do not swear to the original Hippocratic Oath, the majority of doctors do take an oath — often when they graduate from medical school. Despite early disinterest, physician oaths began to come into vogue after World War II. During the Holocaust, doctors in Nazi concentration camps committed previously inconceivable atrocities against prisoners.
Experimenting with extreme temperatures, radiation, untested drugs and vaccines, unnecessary and sometimes bizarre surgeries and infecting captives with deadly diseases, the exploits of concentration camp physicians shocked and horrified the world.
Sane doctors realized stricter rules, and a code of ethics, were needed. I solemnly pledge to consecrate my life to the service of humanity. I will not permit considerations of age, disease or disability, creed, ethnic origin, gender, nationality, political affiliation, race, sexual orientation, social standing or any other factor to intervene between my duty and my patient;.
I will not use my medical knowledge to violate human rights and civil liberties, even under threat.
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