Default Positions in Clinical Ethics.

AbstractDefault positions, predetermined starting points that aid in complex decision-making, are common in clinical medicine. In this article, we identify and critically examine common default positions in clinical ethics practice. Whether default positions ought to be held is an important normative question, but here we are primarily interested in the descriptive, rather than normative, properties of default positions.

Ethical and Professional Considerations in Integrated Behavioral Health.

Integrated behavioral health models of care offer many benefits for patient experience and outcomes. However, multidisciplinary teams are comprised of professionals who each may have different professional norms and ethical obligations, which may at times be in conflict. This article offers a framework for negotiating potential conflicts between professional norms and expectations across disciplines involved in integrated behavioral health teams.

Counter-Transference and the Clinical Ethics Encounter: What, Why, and How We Feel During Consultations.

One of the more draining aspects of being a clinical ethicist is dealing with the emotions of patients, family members, as well as healthcare providers. Generally, by the time a clinical ethicist is called into a case, stress levels are running high, patience is low, and interpersonal communication is strained. Management of this emotional burden of clinical ethics is an underexamined aspect of the profession and academic literature.

The Conditions for Ethical Application of Restraints.

Despite the lack of evidence for the effectiveness of physical restraints, their use in patients is widespread. The best ethical justification for restraining patients is that it prevents them from harming themselves. We argue that even if the empirical evidence supported their effectiveness in achieving this aim, the use of restraints would nevertheless be unethical, so long as well-known exceptions to informed consent fail to apply.

Commentary: Clarifying Medical Decisionmaking-Who, How, and Why?

In its simplest interpretation, this is a case about goals of care and appropriate code status. At the outset, we must confess that we found this case to be extremely interesting-not for the novelty of the issues or its ethical complexity but because it is truly a case of the ordinary. Too often when teaching or discussing clinical ethics cases, we are distracted by the exotic and the unusual and ignore the mundane cases that every practicing clinical ethicist must be able to competently manage.