Pediatric Discharge From the Emergency Department Against Medical Advice.

In this Ethics Rounds we present a conflict regarding discharge planning for a febrile infant in the emergency department. The physician believes discharge would be unsafe and would constitute a discharge against medical advice. The child's mother believes her son has been through an already extensive and painful evaluation and would prefer to monitor her well-appearing son closely at home with a safety plan and a next-day outpatient visit.

"I'm going home": discharges against medical advice.

Discharge against medical advice (AMA), in which a patient chooses to leave the hospital before the treating physician recommends discharge, continues to be a common and vexing problem. This article reviews the prevalence, costs, predictors, and potential interventions for this clinical problem. Between 1% and 2% of all medical admissions result in an AMA discharge.