Affect, Values and Problems Assessing Decision-Making Capacity

Area of Science:

• Medical Ethics
• Cognitive Science
• Philosophy of Medicine

Background:

• Current medical decision-making capacity assessments primarily rely on evaluating core cognitive abilities.
• Critics highlight limitations, particularly in cases where mental disorders influence patient values without impairing cognition.

Purpose of the Study:

• To propose a re-conceptualization of decision-making capacity in medical treatment.
• To offer a new framework that addresses problematic cases identified by critics.

Main Methods:

• Conceptual analysis of decision-making capacity.
• Development of a new criterion based on tracking personal interests.
• Evaluation of the proposed solution against ethical constraints and potential for abuse.

Main Results:

• A proposed definition of decision-making capacity: the ability to track one's personal interests comparably to most individuals.
• Demonstration that this re-conceptualization resolves previously identified problem cases.

Conclusions:

• The proposed ability-to-track-personal-interests model offers a robust solution for assessing medical decision-making capacity.
• This approach avoids dangerous alterations to existing criteria and upholds ethical principles.