Compassion and Conscience

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"Get your morning after pill before the night before is also good advice. Exercise the system like a fire drill with a bit of "what if" and have a pill on hand just in case. That takes the panic out of it."

Unfortunately this doesn't work so well with rape victims.

Columbia MD:

That's called malpractice which is really what the question is leading to. Can doctors or pharmacists that willfully withhold information that is done as a matter of conscience be sued, and win of course?

I think in most states the doctor that refused services based upon race would be sued. What the doctor does in cases like you mentioned is to not be very good at whatever it is. Doctors can have a lapse of skill but not a withholding of services. Choose your doctor well is always in order.

Get your morning after pill before the night before is also good advice. Exercise the system like a fire drill with a bit of "what if" and have a pill on hand just in case. That takes the panic out of it.

"A doctor, a lawyer or any other professional should not be forced to act against their conscience, which could be based on either religious or philosophical convictions."

So, in your view if a woman is in surgery and complications arise and the surgeon is called in and he notes that the woman is white and the father of the child is black, if the surgeon has a 'philosophical conviction' that the mixing of the races is bad, the surgeon should simply be able to recuse himself -- even if it means that the woman dies before another doctor can be found?

And you don't believe the state should in any way be able to penalize this surgeon?

Can't help but notice that insurance companies win with this one so it should fly, "Today, the ethical obligation that is most ignored is our obligation to the millions of Americans who do not have medical insurance."

Those who rely on charity will always be disappointed in the long run. Politicians and the ministry have another intersection of agreement. Now if we can only figure a way to give the church taxing power. "Happily, the AMA is supporting extension and expansion of SCHIP (the State Children's Health Insurance Program), which will take care of an additional four to five million low-income children. This is the medical profession being ethical and compassionate. Let’s pray that the White House follows their lead."

There are, (at least were) Catholic charities that worked well and were run by people who got nothing more for their efforts than the feelings a job well done brings. Unfortunately, like nearly all other cases of large sums of money being accumulated in one place, the vultures have shown up and now those in need of help can rely on them. Same thing in a different way seems to happen to money in the hands of governments, all governments.

I didn't see John Q, so I can't respond to the reference.

IMO, the solution is for people not to go into fields where they cannot perform the duties of the job without violating their consciences. If I were a vegan, I wouldn't apply for work at a butcher shop.

If I believed dancing was a sin, I wouldn't work at a disco.

If I were unwilling to perform an abortion even to save the life of the mother, I wouldn't become an OB/GYN.

If I weren't willing to dispense Plan B, I wouldn't become a pharmacist.

If I weren't willing to honor a hospitalized person's wish to not be implanted with a feeding tube, then I wouldn't become a doctor.
And we had this argument witht he hospital over my grandmother's care. She had a WRITTEN, NOTARIZED directive forbidding certain measures, including insertion of a feeding tube that was IN HER CHART. My mom left one evening, came back the next morning, and a feeding tube had been inserted. My mom told the doctor that it needed to be removed at once, and he refused. It wasn't until she raised forty-seven kinds of hell, finally contacting the hospital chief of staff and threatening him with a malpractice suit against the hospital of a magnitude that would end with her owning the place that she was finally able to get the feeding tube removed.

Lepidopteryx,

So,what is the solution ?

John Q,Denzel Washington.
Shall you storm the Hospital ?

I'm diverging from my usual abhorrence of repeated comments, but this was my reaction to many of the answers to this question.
This is a completely different proposition depending on where you live. Those of us who are writing from large cities where there is an abundance of choices in medical care can talk about referring patients to different professionals. In some places, whether because they are rural or deeply steeped in a single religious ethos, those choices do not exist.

It really does not matter because as long as money is deemed more valuable then human life, our health care systems won't change and we certainly do not want government run health care because we all know what happens whenever the government tries to run things, they get all fubar. The real change needs to come to the physicians whether they are in it for the money or are they in it to truly help? I am not saying all are bad, but think about this, who really helps you the Nurse or the doctor? Also when they quit letting the Pharmaceutical companies dictate what they can use for just prolonging an ailment instead of curing it, because reality is cures=no more money, prolonging a disease= Billions. The real drug dealers we need to go after. So there is more to your question then people seem to beleive. Also the money for these programs, again at the cost of the middle class. Why don't they get the money from the same place the schools where supposed to get money from, the lottery, the casino's riverboats, oh yeah again unfullfilled promises. Before we can fix anything we have to have the Truth. God bless and peace always.Matthew

**For example, a patient may need an organ transplant, but a doctor would be forbidden to use a stolen organ or to unfairly prefer this patient to others in the queue.**

True. But what if the doctor has a religious objection to transplants, and based on that, does not tell the patient that a transplant could save his life? What if the doctor thinks the patient is a poor risk for transplant and so doesn't mention that as an option? Is that ethical? In my view, no.