Protection Of Physicians Research Articles

Staff and physician protection in neurointervention during the coronavirus disease-2019 pandemic: A summary review and recommendations.

The coronavirus disease-2019 pandemic, caused by the novel severe acute respiratory distress syndrome coronavirus 2, has to date resulted in an estimated global death toll of more than 1.5 million with more than 69 million reported cases worldwide. It has become increasingly clear that delivery of effective neurointerventional clinical care means maintaining an able and safe workforce in a rapidly changing environment. Staff and physician protection has become increasingly topical and relevant within the angiography suite both in peripheral and cardiac intervention and in neurointervention. The following review outlines the types of personal protective equipment relevant to neurointerventional care, summarises society guidelines and makes recommendations for the provision of safe care to both staff and patients.

Echocardiography during the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic - the impact of the vaccination program. A 2021 update of the expert opinion of the Working Group on Echocardiography of the Polish Cardiac Society.

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic resulted in an urgent need to reorganize the work of echocardiography laboratories in order to ensure the safety of patients and the protection of physicians, technicians, and other staff members. In the previous Expert Opinion of the Working Group on Echocardiography of Polish Cardiac Society we provided recommendations for the echocardiographic services, in order to ensure maximum possible safety and efficiency of imagers facing epidemic threat. Now, with much better knowledge and larger experience in treating COVID-19 patients and with introduction of vaccination programs, we present updated recommendations for performing transthoracic and transesophageal examinations, including information on the potential impact of personnel and the patient vaccination program, and growing numbers of convalescents on performance of echocardiographic laboratories, with the goal of their ultimate reopening.

Guidelines for Frontline Health Care Staff Safety for COVID-19.

This document establishes safety guidelines for physicians, nurses, and allied health care and facility staff who may be exposed to patients infected with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) in a health care facility. SARS-CoV-2 infection is highly contagious and places health care workers at risk for infection resulting in coronavirus disease (COVID-19). Physicians, nurses, and allied health care and facility staff in all frontline environments must be provided and utilize necessary personal protective equipment (PPE). It is important that health care staff adopt a universal set of guidelines in which to conduct themselves in order to minimize infection with the SARS-CoV-2 contagion. The establishment of these guidelines is necessary in this viral pandemic since such directives can create a standard of safety that is universally accepted. These guidelines establish a framework to provide consistency among health care facilities and staff from the time the staff member arrives at the health care facility until they return home. These guidelines provide a practical description of the minimum necessary protection for physicians, nurses, and allied health care and facility staff against SARS-CoV-2 infection.

The conscientious objection: debate on emergency contraception.

The authors discuss the emergency contraception (EC) topic, assessing scientific and ethical aspects. The almost totality of the studies carried out tends to report on the use of drugs as an emergency measure to prevent pregnancy. However, it is not yet completely excluded that emergency contraceptives can induce medical abortion. The debate on side effects of EC continues to be a highly emotional and controversial issue both for advocates who believe they will lower considerably the number of unintended pregnancies and abortions, and for opponents who believe that using emergency contraception amounts to an abortion. This latter hypothesis highlights the conflicting aspect of the conscientious objection to abortion of physicians and pharmacists. This research work is aimed at investigating the emergency contraception issue, paying particular attention to the medico-legal and regulatory aspects of this subject. Particularly, the authors focus on the conscientious objection in order to assess, if any, legal protection for physicians and pharmacists who claim a right to conscientious objection. Inappropriate use of EC could be resolved through a registry of user. This registry, of course, would not have the intention of persecution, but would only serve to detect possible cases of subjugation, exploitation and harassment.

Electronic Fetal Monitoring, Cerebral Palsy Litigation, and Bioethics: The Evils in Pandora’s Box

Pandora opened the box releasing death and all other evils into the world. She hastened to close the lid but the whole content had escaped except for one thing at the bottom of the box - HOPE. Paraphrase of the Greek Myth in Hesiod’s Works and Days. Edward Hon opened the Electronic Fetal Monitoring (EFM) Pandora’s Box in the 1950s. Although perhaps noble in original purpose, the unintended EFM consequences over the last half century resulted in more harm than good to mothers and babies in most of the industrialized world. EFM became the standard of care not because it was scientifically efficacious, but because it was promoted by physicians with undisclosed conflicts of interests and because obstetricians desperately wanted to believe that a machine would solve the age old cerebral palsy malady and at the same time protect physicians and hospitals from the then new and costly cerebral palsy birth injury lawsuits. EFM became the standard of care at the same time that bioethics became medical reality replacing the medical profession’s Hippocratic paternalistic ethic with patient autonomy and informed consent in virtually all aspects of medical practice except for the use of EFM. The use of EFM without informed consent has continued for fifty years with no outcry from the bioethical world. This article explores this ongoing medical and ethical calamity, and discusses why even today EFM use continues disguised as a safety device when in fact its use is primarily as protection for physicians and hospitals from cerebral palsy lawsuits.

A survey on surgeons' perceived quality of the informed consent process in a Swiss paediatric surgery unit.

AimTo evaluate the levels of satisfaction and opinions on the usefulness of the informed consent form currently in use in our Paediatric Surgery Department.Materials and methodsDesign: Qualitative study carried out via interviews of senior paediatric surgeons, based on a questionnaire built up from reference criteria in the literature and public health law.ResultsPhysicians with between 2 and 35 years experience of paediatric surgery, with a participation rate of 92 %, agreed on the definition of an informed consent form, were satisfied with the form in use and did not wish to modify its structure. The study revealed that signing the form was viewed as mandatory, but meant different things to different participants, who diverged over whom that signature protected. Finally, all respondents were in agreement over what information was necessary for parents of children requiring surgery.ConclusionPaediatric surgeons seemed to be satisfied with the informed consent form in use. Most of them did not identify that the first aim of the informed consent form is to give the patient adequate information to allow him to base his consent, which is a legal obligation, the protection of physicians by the formalisation and proof of the informed consent being secondary. Few surgeons brought up the fact that the foremost stakeholder in paediatric surgery are the children themselves and that their opinions are not always sought. In the future, moving from informed consent process to shared decision-making, a more active bidirectional exchange may be strongly considered. Involving children in such vital decisions should become the norm while keeping in mind their level of maturity.

Exposures in interventional radiology using Monte Carlo simulation coupled with virtual anthropomorphic phantoms

In this work we investigated the way in which conversion coefficients from air kerma-area product for effective doses (CCE) and entrance skin doses (CCESD) in interventional radiology (IR) are affected by variations in the filtration, projection angle of the X-ray beam, lead curtain attached to the surgical table, and suspended shield lead glass in regular conditions of medical practice. Computer simulations were used to model an exposure scenario similar to a real IR room. The patient and the physician were represented by MASH virtual anthropomorphic phantoms, inserted in the MCNPX 2.7.0 radiation transport code. In all cases, the addition of copper filtration also increased the CCE and CCESD values. The highest CCE values were obtained for lateral, cranial and caudal projections. In these projections, the X-ray tube was located above the table, and more scattered radiation reached the middle and upper portions of the physician trunk, where most of the radiosensitive organs are located. Another important result of this study was to show that the physician's protection is 358% higher when the lead curtain and suspended shield lead glasses are used. The values of CCE and CCESD, presented in this study, are an important resource for calculation of effective doses and entrance skin doses in clinical practice.

AMA to Work With APA, Other Groups on Integrated Care

AMA to Work With APA, Other Groups on Integrated Care

Medical chaperoning at a tertiary care hospital in Saudi Arabia: survey of physicians

Background:Medical chaperones (MC) are underutilised. The influence of Islamic culture on the use of MC is not known.Aim:To examine physicians’ use and perception of MC in Islamic culture.Setting:A major tertiary...

Current problems of hospital health including the AIDS problem. "Protection of patients and staff--legal status"

The prevention of HIV infection in hospital, if at all possible, is a general legal obligation. For that reason, special preventive measures against infection are required for blood transfusions, transplantations or semen donations. On the other hand, comprehensive information on the risks of infection and the permanent reminder of hygienic directions are considered to be sufficient for the protection of physicians and nursing staffs. However, the arguments for such a careless handling are not convincing. HIV testing of patients for the protection of the medical staff must not be relinquished. However, the current jurisdiction does not permit to carry out HIV tests without the patients' consent following comprehensive information; furthermore, the consequences resulting from a positive as well as a negative test have to be explained to the patients. In case of established infection further transmission must be prevented by all means.

A CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF CRITICISMS OF THE OREGON DEATH WITH DIGNITY ACT

ABSTRACT This article critically examines the validity of common criticisms of the Oregon Death with Dignity Act, primarily through reviewing published research and analyses. After summarizing the law and recent developments, 11 areas of concerns are examined: (a) the amount of data collected, (b) the availability of the data, (c) the reporting process, (d) protection of physicians, (e) terminal illness as a requirement, (f) the amount of data on palliative care interventions, (g) data on lethal prescriptions, (h) data on psychological/psychiatric evaluations, (i) whether the decision to request medication is informed, (j) whether the request is voluntary, and (k) financial factors. The authors examine each of these areas of concern and find criticisms to be unfounded given the research and analyses conducted to date.

Protection for Physicians

Protection for Physicians

Feudal lords of science and medicine.

Feudal lords of science and medicine.

Organizational Control of Hospital Infrastructure Determines the Quality of Care

Hospital personnel and their performance underlie all hospital facilities and patient services (the hospital infrastructure). Hence, quality patient care is not exclusively in the domain of the medical staff and must be regarded as a comprehensive responsibility of the hospital. Hospitals must establish behavioral quality systems and teach employees not only how to do their job well to meet technical quality standards, but also how to fulfill patient expectations. Critical and life threatening problems are thereon prevented or minimized, and protection of physicians and hospitals from litigation improves as a result. Governing boards must provide a role model and demand excellence of everyone, in order to improve the performance of the hospital infrastructure.

Economic Incentives and Organizational Realities: Managing Hospitals under DRGs

Diagnosis-related Groups (DRGs) offer hospitals financial incentives to improve efficiency. To be effective, DRGs require a realignment of management so that physicians' use of resources can be disciplined by administrators. The constituency for altering power relationships within hospitals, however, is, at best, a weak one: administrators see their primary task as the protection of physicians' clinical autonomy. Constraints imposed on hospitals by regulators can be accommodated by minor adjustments in behavior that ensure neither gains in efficiency nor changes in decision-making authority.

Course Manual on Radiation Protection for Physicians. Vol III: The Handling of Unsealed Radionuclides

Course Manual on Radiation Protection for Physicians. Vol III: The Handling of Unsealed Radionuclides

Medical discipline. Part V. Constitutional considerations- protection of physicians' rights.

Medical discipline. Part V. Constitutional considerations- protection of physicians' rights.

Protection for Physicians in the Armed Forces

Protection for Physicians in the Armed Forces

LONDON

<h3>Annual Meeting of the British Medical Association</h3> The ninety-second annual meeting of the British Medical Association was held at Bradford, an important Yorkshire town and center of the woollen industry. About 1,000 members attended. At the representative meeting some subjects of great importance were discussed, such as the protection of physicians from litigation as the result of certification. A resolution was moved that the provision of a certificate under the lunacy acts by a physician should have the legal testimony status of testimony given in a court of law, and should not render the physician liable either to any civil action or to any criminal charge, except so far as the certificate may be shown to contain statements of essential importance, which are proved to be inaccurate and to have been made with intention to deceive. It was pointed out that the responsibility of certifying was accepted by the profession