Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jul 8, 2026

A Treatment Package without Escape Extinction to Address Food Selectivity
04:23

A Treatment Package without Escape Extinction to Address Food Selectivity

Published on: August 21, 2015

Withdrawal of treatment in children

T Vince1, A Petros

  • 1Kings College Hospital, London.

British Journal of Hospital Medicine (London, England : 2005)
|January 12, 2008
PubMed

Insights

Parents are legal decision-makers for critically ill children. This review covers ethical, legal, and practical issues surrounding withdrawal of treatment, crucial for end-of-life care.

Area of Science:

  • Pediatric critical care medicine
  • Bioethics
  • Medical law

Background:

  • Medical advancements allow prolonged life support for critically ill children.
  • Treatment withdrawal is increasingly common, shifting end-of-life care focus from resuscitation failure.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To review the ethical, legal, and practical considerations of withdrawing treatment in pediatric critical care.
  • To explore the interplay between these aspects in end-of-life decision-making for children.

Main Methods:

  • Literature review of ethical, legal, and practical aspects of treatment withdrawal.
  • Analysis of parental roles as surrogate decision-makers in pediatric end-of-life care.

Main Results:

  • Treatment withdrawal is a complex process with significant ethical and legal dimensions.
  • Parents hold legal authority as surrogate decision-makers, necessitating careful consideration of their role.

Conclusions:

  • Understanding the multifaceted aspects of treatment withdrawal is essential for healthcare providers.
  • Ethical, legal, and practical frameworks must support informed parental decision-making in pediatric end-of-life care.

Related Concept Videos

Pharmacokinetics in Pediatric Patients: Drug Excretion01:26

Pharmacokinetics in Pediatric Patients: Drug Excretion

In pediatric medicine, understanding the renal function and drug elimination nuances is crucial for administering safe and effective treatments. Newborns, in particular, display markedly slower renal functions than adults, profoundly affecting how drugs are cleared from their bodies. This slower drug clearance requires clinicians to extend the dosing intervals for many medications to prevent drug accumulation and toxicity while ensuring therapeutic efficacy.One key area where these adjustments...
Drug Dosing: Infants and Children01:29

Drug Dosing: Infants and Children

Pediatric patient dosages diverge from adults due to disparities in body surface area, total body water, and extracellular fluid per kilogram of body weight. The dosing regimen considers the variations in pharmacokinetics and pharmacology across distinct age groups, encompassing preterm newborns, infants, young children, older children, and adolescents. Calculation of pediatric patient doses is predicated on determining body surface area, which exhibits a superior correlation with the child's...
Pharmacokinetics in Pediatric Patients: Overview and Drug Absorption01:23

Pharmacokinetics in Pediatric Patients: Overview and Drug Absorption

Understanding the physiological differences in the pediatric population is crucial for effective pharmacotherapy. Neonates, infants, and children exhibit significant variations in gastric pH, gastric emptying time, intestinal transit time, and biliary function. These variations profoundly affect oral drug absorption, necessitating a nuanced approach to pediatric dosing.Neonates present with a unique physiological profile, having a gastric pH greater than 4 and faster and more irregular gastric...
Pharmacokinetics in Pediatric Patients: Drug Metabolism01:24

Pharmacokinetics in Pediatric Patients: Drug Metabolism

In pediatric care, understanding the nuances of hepatic drug metabolism is crucial, as it significantly differs from that of adults. This divergence is primarily due to the developmental stage of drug-metabolizing enzymes, which affects how medications are processed in the body. In neonates, for instance, the activity of Phase I enzymes—critical for the initial breakdown of drugs—is markedly reduced, functioning at just 20–40% of the levels seen in adults. This reduction poses a challenge in...
Desensitization and Tachyphylaxis01:20

Desensitization and Tachyphylaxis

Tachyphylaxis is described as a rapid decrease in response to a drug after repeated or continuous administration of the same drug dose. It is a phenomenon where the body becomes less responsive to a particular substance or intervention over time, requiring higher doses or stronger interventions to achieve the same effect. It results from adaptive changes in the body's receptors, signaling pathways, or physiological processes that occur in response to prolonged exposure to a stimulus.
Several...
Pharmacokinetics in Pediatric Patients: Drug Distribution01:17

Pharmacokinetics in Pediatric Patients: Drug Distribution

Drug distribution in the pediatric population exhibits unique challenges and considerations due to the physiological differences between children, particularly neonates and infants, and adults. A crucial aspect of pediatric pharmacology is understanding how these differences impact the pharmacokinetics of various drugs, necessitating age-specific dosing strategies to ensure efficacy and safety.Neonates and infants have a higher total body water content, ~75%–90% of their body weight, compared...