Bioethical implications of end-of-life decision-making in patients with dementia: a tale of two societies.

End-of-life decision-making in patients with dementia is a complex topic. Belgium and the Netherlands have been at the forefront of legislative advancement and progressive societal changes concerning the perspectives toward physician-assisted death (PAD). Careful consideration of clinical and social aspects is essential during the end-of-life decision-making process in patients with dementia.

Human leukocyte antigens class II genes are associated with cancer development in the autoimmune rheumatic diseases.

Objective: To determine the association between HLA class II alleles and the probability of developing cancer in patients with autoimmune rheumatic diseases. MATERIAL AND METHODS; A matched case control study was conducted in which patients with autoimmune rheumatic disease who later developed malignancy (solid or lymphoproliferative) were compared with matched controls suffering from the same auto-immune rheumatic disease and with similar disease duration. The rheumatic diseases included rheumatoid arthritis, systemic lupus erythematosus, primary Sjögren syndrome, dermatomyositis-polymyositis, and systemic sclerosis.

[Medicine: conflicts of interest in research].

A conflict of interest is a set of conditions in which professional judgment concerning a primary interest (patient's welfare, research integrity, ethics, education) tends to be influenced by a secondary interest. Among secondary interests are intellectual conflicts of interest that include the desire for faculty advancement, competition for sponsored research funding, to win prestigious research prizes, as well as financial conflicts of interest that arise when medical investigators own equity in a company that sponsors the study they conduct or when they serve as consultants to companies or are members of the company's advisory boards. Ethical conflicts of interest predominate in undeveloped countries.