The Ethics Of Everyday Medicine

Ethics of Everyday Medicine: Explorations of Justice examines and analyses the relatively unexplored domain of ethics involved in the everyday practice of medicine. From the author’s clinical experience, virtually every decision made in the day-to-day practice of medicine is fundamentally an ethical question, as virtually every decision hinge on some value judgment that goes beyond the medical facts of the matter. The first part of the book is devoted to medical decision cases in several areas of medicine. These cases highlight elements of the current healthcare ecosystem, involving players other than the physician and patient. Insurers (private, commercial, and governmental), administrators, and regulators’ perspectives are surfaced in point of care case analysis. Part two contributes to the development of actionable tools to develop better ethical systems for the everyday practice of medicine by providing a critical analysis of Reflective Equilibrium and ethical induction from the perspective of logic and statistics. The chapter on Justice discusses the neurophysiological representations of just and unjust behaviours. The chapter on Ethical Theories follows, describing the epistemic conundrum, principlism, reproducibility, abstraction, chaos and complexity. The following chapter approaches ethical decisions from the logic and statistic perspectives. The following chapter, The Patient as Parenthetical, the author discusses patient-centric ethics, and the rise of business- and government-cetric ethics. The final chapter, A Framework to Frame the Questions for Explore Further, proposes a working framework to deal with current ethical issues. Ethics of everyday Medicine: Explorations of Justice acknowledges that there are no answers yet to the ethical dilemmas that confront the everyday practice of medicine, but proposes a framework for deeper analysis and action. This reading would be useful to all healthcare professionals. Regulators and policy makers could also benefit from understanding how the complex healthcare environment influences medical decisions at point of care. Offers an overview of the current health care ecosystem and the ethical questions posed by divergent interests Includes cases for ethical analysis of common medical practice Proposes a framework for ethical decision making in the clinical setting Provides critical analysis of Reflective Equilibrium and ethical induction from the perspective of logic and statistics

Everyday Medical Ethics and Law is based on the core chapters of Medical Ethics Today, focussing on the practical issues and dilemmas common to all doctors. It includes chapters on the law and professional guidance relating to consent, treating people who lack capacity, treating children and young people, confidentiality and health records. The title is UK-wide, covering the law and guidance in each of the four nations. Each chapter has a uniform structure which makes it ideal for use in learning and teaching. "10 Things You Need to Know About..." introduces the key points of the topic, Setting the Scene explains where the issues occur in real life and why doctors need to understand them, and then key definitions are followed by explanations of different scenarios. The book uses real cases to illustrate points and summary boxes to highlight key issues throughout. Whilst maintaining its rigorous attention to detail, Everyday Medical Ethics and Law is an easy read reference book for busy, practising doctors.

This book explores the moral lives of mental health clinicians serving the most marginalized individuals in the US healthcare system. Drawing on years of fieldwork in a community psychiatry outreach team, Brodwin traces the ethical dilemmas and everyday struggles of front line providers. On the street, in staff room debates, or in private confessions, these psychiatrists and social workers confront ongoing challenges to their self-image as competent and compassionate advocates. At times they openly question the coercion and forced-dependency built into the current system of care. At other times they justify their use of extreme power in the face of loud opposition from clients. This in-depth study exposes the fault lines in today's community psychiatry. It shows how people working deep inside the system struggle to maintain their ideals and manage a chronic sense of futility. Their commentaries about the obligatory and the forbidden also suggest ways to bridge formal bioethics and the realities of mental health practice. The experiences of these clinicians pose a single overarching question: how should we bear responsibility for the most vulnerable among us?

It's hard out there on the frontlines of healthcare when it comes to medical ethics. Sometimes it feels like the world is making up the rules as we go along. Sometimes it feels like we cannot get our moral balance as the landscape changes and seemingly grows more complicated every day. But no matter what the world throws at us each day, we have a choice of how to respond. It is easy to say we will do the right thing for our patients, but how do we know what that really means? How do we reconcile the cultural context that has entered healthcare? How do we span the gap between what is legal and what is ethical? How do we continue to care for patients without having anxiety, confusion, and fear? This book presents some of the basic principles of medical ethics and their application to everyday healthcare. Hopefully, the reader will begin to understand some of the underlying concepts of medical ethics that can be readily applied to their practice. Moreover, Dr. Cen hopes that this book sparks the reader's interest in medical ethics and increases their engagement in discussion, legislation, and policies decision-making about medical ethics.Dr. Puxiao Cen is an invasive cardiologist, board-certified in internal medicine, cardiovascular disease, advanced heart failure and transplant cardiology, nuclear cardiology, and comprehensive echocardiography. She has been a Fellow of the American College of Cardiology since 2003 and has been caring for the people of the Orlando, FL area for two decades. Puxiao is also a physician member of the Medical Ethics Committee for the area health system and Assistant Professor at the University of Central Florida, College of Medicine. In addition to being a physician and a medical ethicist, Puxiao is a mother, world traveler (Dora the Explorer comes to mind), painter, history student, and a cultural connoisseur. She is a woman who puts her whole heart, mind, and soul into everything she does-she is the epitome of a Philomath. But, labels do not do her justice. Puxiao doesn't just absorb all that the world has to offer and keep that learning and knowledge locked away inside her. Dr. Cen considers it her mission to process and refine the knowledge she has gained from her experiences and distill it down to the salient points so she can recommunicate that knowledge in a manner that can benefit everyone. That philosophy was the motivation behind writing Everyday Medical Ethics. Dr. Cen wants to help impart some of the lessons she has learned as a medical ethicist in a major health system to the general public. By doing so, she hopes that the healthcare professional, patients, their families, and the communities in which they live can better navigate the modern world of healthcare. Even though this book is being published during the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic, Puxiao actually completed the book in late 2018, so there are no case studies or references to COVID19 in the book. However, the basic principles discussed in the book are foundational to understanding medical ethics and can be applied to patient care and research ethics during the pandemic.

Being a patient is a unique interpersonal experience but it is also a universal human experience. The relationships formed when we are patients can also teach some of life's most important lessons, and these relationships provide a special window into ethics, especially the ethics of healthcare professionals. This book answers two basic questions: As patients see it, what things allow relationships with healthcare providers to become therapeutic? What can this teach us about healthcare ethics? This volume presents detailed descriptions and analyses of 50 interviews with 58 patients, representing a wide spectrum of illnesses and clinician specialties. The authors argue that the structure, rhythm, and horizon of routine patient care are ultimately grounded in patient vulnerability and clinician responsiveness. From the short interview segments, the longer vignettes and the full patient stories presented here emerge the neglected dimensions of healthcare and healthcare ethics. What becomes visible is an ethics of everyday interdependence, with mutual responsibilities that follow from this moral symbiosis. Both professional expressions of healthcare ethics and the field of bioethics need to be informed and reformed by this distinctive, more patient-centered, turn in how we understand both patient care as a whole and the ethics of care more specifically. The final chapters present revised codes of ethics for health professionals, as well as the implications for medical and health professions education.

Deals entirely with personal ethical matters that affect the physician in his or her everyday professional life rather than with global or societal ethical issues such as euthanasia or genetic engineering. This book deals with the concept of "doing right" regarding generally accepted principles for individual behavior, especially in relation to patient care and within the context of the everyday life of the physician. First concern is doing right for and with patients in interactions in the: personal patient environment (family, home), medical environment (office, hospital) and community resources (nursing home). Other physician roles - teaching, research, administration, community resources (nursing home) are also pertinent to doing right.

The first textbook on the subject, this is a practical, clinically comprehensive guide to ethical issues in surgical practice, research, and education written by some of the most prominent figures in the fields of surgery and bioethics. Discussions of informed consent, confidentiality, and advance directives--core concepts integral to every surgeon-patient relationship--open the volume. Seven chapters tackle the ethical issues in surgical practice, covering the full range of surgical patients--from emergency, acute, high-risk, and elective patients, to poor surgical risk and dying patients. The book even considers the special relationship between the surgeon and patients who are family members or friends. Chapters on surgical research and education address innovation, self-regulation in practice and research, and the prevention of unwarranted bias. Two chapters focus on the multidisciplinary nature of surgery, including the relationships between surgery and other medical specialties and the obligations of the surgeon to other members of the surgical team. The economic dimensions of surgery, especially within managed care, are addressed in chapters on the surgeons financial relationships with patients, conflicts of interest, and relationships with payers and institutions. The authors do not engage in abstract discussions of ethical theory; instead, their discussions are always directly relevant to the everyday concerns of practicing surgeons. This well-integrated volume is intended for practicing surgeons, medical educators, surgical residents, bioethicists, and medical students.

Medical ethics is a system of moral principles that apply values to the practice of clinical medicine and in scientific research. Medical ethics allow for people, regardless of background, to be guaranteed quality and principled care. It is based on a set of values that professionals can refer to in the case of any confusion or conflict. These values include the respect for autonomy, non-maleficence, beneficence, and justice. These tenets allow doctors, care providers, and families to create a treatment plan and work towards the same common goal without any conflict. Succeeding in the healthcare field means more than just making a diagnosis and writing a prescription. Healthcare professionals are responsible for convincing patients and their family members of the best course of action and treatments to follow, while knowing how to make the right moral and ethical choices. Ethical teaching should be an active part of training and should be taught in four division: basic ethics, clinical ethics, legal principles related to ethics and the ethics of research and affiliation. This book is a reference guide for physicians, healthcare providers and administrative staff. It looks at the ethical problems they face every day, gives the background and the ethical problem and then provides practical advice which can be easily implemented. This book provides the knowledge needed to understand who has the right to healthcare, the justice of clinical practice, what autonomy means for a patient giving consent, who is going to make any surrogate decisions and more.