Medical Ethics Advisor – August 1, 2012
August 1, 2012
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ACA ruling is ethical landmark: Health care is
The most important ethical implication of the Supreme Court's ruling upholding the Affordable Care Act is "the recognized national responsibility to provide medical care for all citizens," according to Neil S. Wenger, MD, MPH, director of the University of California--Los Angeles (UCLA) Health System Ethics Center and professor at UCLA's Division of General Internal Medicine. -
Diagnostic neuroimaging for psych patients — ethical?
Does a psychiatrist offer diagnostic neuroimaging to their patients and claim to diagnose and treat psychiatric disorders using the results? -
"Difficult trade-off" with research regs
The goal of proposed reforms in regulations governing human research subjects is to enhance protections for research subjects while reducing burden, delay, and ambiguity for investigators, according to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Office of Science Policy, which received more than 1,000 public comments on the proposed changes. -
Placebos: What place do they have in medicine?
There are several ethical questions surrounding the American Medical Association's policy prohibiting physicians from giving substances they believe are placebos to their patients unless the patient is informed of and agrees to use of the substance, according to a 2012 report from the Hastings Center. -
Melanoma misdiagnosis brings ethical pitfalls
There are multiple ethical and legal considerations involved with the misdiagnosis of a melanoma, according to a recently published commentary. -
Ethical responses needed for inappropriate requests
When a friend or acquaintance asks for informal medical advice, Steven Brown, MD, a clinical associate professor at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, gives this standard reply: "I would be doing you a great disservice by pretending that I could give you good medical advice outside the context of a thorough review of your full medical history and an appropriate physical examination."