#Midico waste plus

In Good Medical Practice, 3 the GMC states: The duty of care remains despite the refusal. Information must be provided in objective terms, if necessary recruiting colleagues with special expertise to provide further advice, but scaremongering is out of the question.Д®qually, doctors cannot wash their hands of patients simply because they will not toe the line. The duty on the doctor is to ensure that patients understand the implications of their proposed course of action. What is the doctor's duty in these circumstances? Extract from the GMC's guidance on good medical practice 2ДЄs can be seen from the extract, there is now a considerable duty on doctors to explain the available treatments and the patients' rights in some detail. The GMC booklet Seeking Patients' Consent: The Ethical Considerations 2 gives specific advice on information that should be given to patients (see extract in Figure 1, below). How much information should the doctor give?ДЄssuming the patient to be competent, how much information should be given to a patient about prospective treatments? If the answer to all three questions is yes, the patient is competent to give or withhold consent.

Can he or she weigh it in the balance to arrive at a choice?.

the implications of accepting or rejecting the various treatment options?

Does the patient understand the treatment information, i.e.

Deciding whether or not someone is competent can also be broken down into three stages: 1 It may be tempting to assume that any patient who fails to follow good advice is not competent, but that is not the test.

He or she must have sufficient information to be able to make a choice.

Informed refusal, just like informed consent, comprises three elements:

#Midico waste plus

If he does not, the doctor may face disciplinary action by the General Medical Council, plus possible civil and criminal proceedings in battery. Where a competent adult refuses treatment recommended by guidelines, the doctor is bound to respect that refusal. Their reasons do not have to be sound or rational indeed, they do not have to give any reasons at all. What should the doctor do if a patient refuses treatment?ДЄdult competent patients are entitled to accept or reject treatment options. But the two may also conflict where an informed patient decides, perhaps in the doctor's view irrationally, to reject a course of treatment recommended by guidelines in favour of something untried, untested or even clearly detrimental to the patient's health. The 1990s witnessed the demise of clinical autonomy and paternalism, and in their place came informed consent theory and evidence-based practice incorporating protocols, guidelines and audit.Д«oth have been heralded as significant boosts to improved standards of healthcare.