The US government, in collaboration with different medical organizations, has formulated rules and regulations that govern how healthcare is provided and accessed. These policies are referred to as medical ethics and dictate the roles and responsibilities of different stake holders to each other. For patients, medical ethics are important because they allow them to choose their preferred treatment methods and guarantee their privacy and safety during treatment.
Patient’s Autonomy
Allowing patients to make their own decisions regarding the kind of treatment they should apply is one of the most fundamental obligations of medical personnel. As Bernstein (2018) emphasizes, healthcare providers are “allowed to educate the patient but…not…to make the decision for the patient” (para. 2). Healthcare personnel understand various treatment methodologies, drugs, and diagnoses better than their patients. Therefore, they are allowed to recommend medical interventions to patients but not force them to apply it. The autonomy allows the client to choose whether or not they want to go through the economic, social, and physical changes that might accompany the procedure. Moreover, healthcare workers are encouraged to suggest the drugs that patients should take but not coerce them to use the medicine. Similarly, autonomy allows them to decide whether to suffer the financial and physical consequences of taking the medicine or resort other treatments. Therefore, a patient’s right to treatment autonomy should be upheld at all times.
Patient’s Confidentiality and Privacy
Another major obligation of a patient’s doctor is to treat their medical information as private and confidential. Demirsoy and Kirimlioglu (2016) advance this argument by stating that healthcare providers are supposed to protect “the data and information relative to an individual’s state of health, and to the medical/surgical treatments to which he or she is subjected” (p. 1440). This argument is based on the fact that disclosing a patient’s information can hinder their recovery process. For instance, unearthing that a patient has HIV to their family members and friends may result in the sick peron’s stigmatisation and discrimination, which might lengthen their recovery time. Moreover, medical personnel who are afraid of chronic diseases, such as Ebola, might refuse to treat an Ebola patient, despite the medical facility providing efficient protective measures. Therefore, sick people’s medical information should be confidential to allow them access to quality healthcare and full recovery.
Non-Maleficence
Ensuring that all the treatments applied do not harm the patient is yet another core responsibility of any medical personnel to their patient. Motloba (2019) advances that it is “incumbent on clinicians to assess the risks or the occurrence of inadvertent and yet predictable untoward effects of a prescribed intervention” (p. 40). He further explains that harm can imply many things, including causing physical injury, violation of someone’s liberties, and unjust treatment of an individual (Motloba, 2019). Therefore, medical ethics dictate that health personnel should ensure that the treatments they administer do not cause more harm than good to the patient. For instance, a treatment to manage diarrhoea should not infect the patient with a more severe disease, such as cancer. This guideline is important to patients because it protects them from suffering during treatment, enhancing their well-being. Therefore, healthcare personnel should do their best to enforce it.
Conclusion
Jay Leno once said that “we live in an open society, which means they open our emails, open our phone records, and open our medical records”. This open culture, concerning medical records, has to end because it diminishes patients’ well-being and allows them to have access to quality healthcare. For instance, it guarantees their right to choose the treatment they want, protects their medical information from being accessed by irrelevant people, and ensures their safety when seeking treatment. Therefore, medical organisations should do their best to ensure that these rules and regulations are followed.
References
Bernstein, C. (2018). Take control of your health care (exert your patient autonomy). Harvard Health Blog.
Demirsoy, N., & Kirimlioglu, N. (2016). Protection of privacy and confidentiality as a patient right: physicians’ and nurses’ viewpoints. Biomedical Research, 27(4), 1437-1448. Web.
Motloba, P. (2019). Non-maleficence – A disremembered moral obligation. South African Dental Journal, 74(1), 40-42.