Doctors spend years learning how to heal, but most are fairly ignorant about how to act toward patients when they run out of treatments, suggests a study today. Often, once doctors refer a patient to hospice care, they end all … Continue reading →

“Doctors can be involved with decisions concerning withdrawing and withholding treatment, approaching bereaved families about organ donation and assisted reproduction. “Indeed there has never been such an important role for medical ethics to help guide doctors in their everyday decisions.” … Continue reading →

Patient care is being risked by hospital bosses sending medical notes abroad to be typed up, a union says. more

Once a patient becomes terminally ill, relationships between patients, their caregivers and their primary doctors can change. Now a study offers an unusual glimpse of what patients and their doctors are thinking as the end of life approaches — and … Continue reading →

In an editorial in The New England Journal of Medicine, Dr. Howard Brody, professor of family medicine and director of the Institute for the Medical Humanities at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston, writes that the medical profession, … Continue reading →

Kara Neumann, 11, had grown so weak that she could not walk or speak. Her parents, who believe that God alone has the ability to heal the sick, prayed for her recovery but did not take her to a doctor. … Continue reading →

The term informed consent does not have long historical roots. Until recent centuries, healthcare professionals were not held responsible for providing information to patients. more