Recent developments in health law relevant to health care providers

Because health law is changing continually, clinicians must be updated periodically. This article discusses two significant legal developments: the defeat of court-ordered cesarean sections and the new Patient Self-Determination Act. A decision reached by the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia asserted that medical decisions on behalf of a woman and her fetus should be made by the pregnant woman if she is conscious and alert. Although this decision does not supply all the answers, it reiterates judicial support for the primacy of a woman's rights when her welfare is endangered by a procedure designed to safeguard a fetus. The Patient Self-Determination Act, effective December 1991, requires health care providers at hospitals and other sites to supply all adult patients with written information advising them of their rights, to explain the provider's policy for implementing those rights and to document any advance directives supplied by patients.