Medical Futility: the alleged pointlessness of administering particular treatment.
Strong paternalism: when you override someone’s autonomy who can fully operate themselves.
Weak paternalism: when you override someone’s autonomy who can’t make decisions themselves.
Ackerman: doctors should intervene. Essentially talking about how the doctors need to guide the patients to recovery, which is actually sort of limiting their autonomy. The argument is that their autonomy is limited by illness, so they need the help.
Truth-Telling and confidentiality: some people think that you should withhold some truth from patients, others think only in extreme circumstances. The thought it is may benefit them. Same thing goes for confidentiality.
Rule-Utilitarian: They believe in rules that when followed will result in the general wellbeing of everyone. But individual exceptions or acts should be sacrificed to follow these rules even if in those cases they benefit generally?
Act-utilitarian: Individual acts may benefit general wellbeing of everyone. Everything should be taken case by case.
Competence: the ability to render decisions about medical interventions.
Waiver: the patient’s voluntary and deliberate surrendering of the right to informed consent. (Essentially saying other people can make decisions on their behalf).
Therapeutic Privilege: the withholding of relevant information from the patient when the physician believes disclosure would likely do harm.
Informed consent: action of an autonomous and informed person to submit to medical treatment or experimentation.
Equipoise: rationally balanced between multiple alternatives.
The Nuremberg Code: established after the Nazi’s medical studies. Ensures Clinical trials have a moral standard.
Declaration of Helsinki: essentially reiteration of Nuremberg, but discuses subjects who aren’t capable of giving informed consent.
Marcia Angell: She believes that you can only give placebos when you’re actually not sure if the treatment is better than placebo.
Baruch Brody: Argues against Angell, saying that the placebos were ethical because nobody was denied a treatment they would otherwise have available.