A blog of the Emory University Center for Ethics and the Healthcare Ethics Consortium

When I was growing up in the ‘60s and ‘70s, the individual who epitomized the doctor’s doctor—the kind, compassionate, knowledgeable, and eminently trustworthy medical practitioner—was TV’s Marcus Welby. Well, you can’t talk to medical students today about Marcus Welby because they never heard of him. That’s not their fault, though. Today’s learning environments don’t stress an appreciation of the cultural history that shapes our medical encounters, perhaps because it is t

Prior to performing procedures, administering medications, or enrolling patients into clinical trials, physicians and other health care providers are required (both legally and ethically) to obtain “informed consent” from their patients. The concept of “informed consent” may have different meanings depending on the specific medical-legal situation under discussion. Generally speaking, factors such as a patient’s decision making capacity, understanding, voluntariness, and acce