Ethical Decision Making In The Medical Field

Katz states, “the conviction that physicians should decide what is best for their patients, and, therefore, that the authority and power to do so should remain bested in them, continued to have deep hold on the practices of the medical profession “(214).

In addition to statistics, a situation to illustrate the necessity for this proposal can be considered. Imagine a family, Mom, Dad, and their three children, are going out to eat in a nice restaurant for Mom?s birthday. When the waitress asks if they?d like smoking or non-smoking, they Dad requests non, because he is concerned about his family?s health. However, the truth about this decision is that in reality, just being in the restaurant increases the threats to their family.

Some patients never pass beyond this stage and may go from doctor to doctor until they find one who supports their position.

Rarely any physician intends to harm patients when he or she provides treatment to them. Patients see physicians and specialists in full faith that they will get help with a condition. What complicates the patient-doctor relationship is that the outcome of each patient’s treatment is different because of individual health conditions and the course of treatment chosen by the doctor. Problems arise when a patient is not satisfied with care provided by the doctor or in extreme cases when a patient dies. Since most of the time it is hard to clearly determine whether the outcome was solely a result of the course of treatment chosen by the doctor or whether other factors played a role too, quite often patients take their

Assist the patent and family, as appropriate, in coming to a consensus regarding the options that best meet the patient’s goal for care.

Anyway it is not as straightforward or consensual as that. Choosing what qualifies as confirmation, applying exploration to individual cases, and deciding the ideal offset of examination, clinical aptitude, and patient society/inclination are convoluted matters with

and do exactly what they say to do because a doctor is considered to be an authoritative

Individual ethics are important in decision-making within the health care industry. One of the main reasons for that is because often ethical dilemmas occur at lower decision-making levels, and this means that the decision is being made by one person, facing a difficult situation that must be resolved quickly. Another reason that individual ethics are important in health care is that often a manager is unaware that there is an ethical dilemma. Thus, by failing to recognize the ethical dilemma, the manager is resolving the dilemma by his or her actions without realizing that an ethical decision is being made (Mintz, 2011). This very much puts the individual's ethical compass at the center of the decision, because the default decision is the one that is being made, regardless of the ethical implications. If the person is generally ethical, the decision will probably be the right one; if the person lacks ethical standards, the decision could be very poor as result.

In the video Don't Be Fooled By Bad Statistics posted by Emily Dressler three forms of bad statistics are discussed, poorly collected data, leading questions, and misuse if center. Information collected poorly will lead to misleading results and false conclusions. Dressler uses the example of data collected by researchers pertaining to magazine preference during business hours. The data is skewed because of the time of day the information was gleaned rendered the sample not representative of the entire population. Another form of bad statistics has to do with how the desired information was elicited. Leading questions may result in biased responses. Questions need to be worded carefully so the information collected is not influenced by the interviewer. Finally, the video talks about misuse of center. Data can be misleading if not appropriately analyzed. Outliers, an individual value that falls outside the overall pattern of data can prejudice the conclusion leading to incorrect assumptions. An example might be that of the man who drowned in a pond with an average dept of one inch. The pond was one quarter inch deep everywhere but in the center where there was a ten foot hole.

A physician cannot force a patient to undergo a procedure or treatment against his or her will. Physicians must make informed refusal an integral part of their informed consent process. Physician should understand what patients' needs and balance between the psychological need and social and physical health. Sometimes, the stress environment of the doctor made him frustrated and they don't spend enough time with their patient to get the optimum information and don't show interest about patients’ psychosocial problems. When a patient feel that their doctors have a lack of knowledge of other treatment options may also contribute to why patients refuse our treatment plan. Good physician-patient relationship allows a trusting relationship to develop. Most patients will agree to doctors’ treatment strategies if they have a good communication and patients are kept fully informed by their

If a patient makes an enquiry and you are unsure of it is better to seek the correct information from a colleague than to give the wrong information.

Traditionally, the physician was expected to use all of their talents and training in an effort to save the life of their patient, no matter the odds. More recently, the physician’s role has been redefined to preserve the autonomy of the patient. Now physicians must give life saving care only in so far and to the degree desirous of the competent patient.

In his 2013 book, Naked Statistics, Charles Wheelan explains a field that is commonly seen, commonly applied, and commonly misinterpreted: statistics. Though statistical data is ubiquitous in daily life, valid statistical conclusions are not. Wheelan reveals that when data analysis is flawed or incomplete, faulty conclusions abound. Wheelan’s work uncovers statistics’ unscrupulous potential, but also makes a key distinction between deliberate misuse and careless misreading. However, his analysis is less successful in distinguishing common sense from poor judgement, a gap that enables the very statistical issues he describes to perpetuate themselves.

*Used patient history and exam results to make decisions on the treatment protocol appropriate for that individual

you have all the facts before making any recommendations. For example, if a patient has high