[The dignity and rights of the patient]

In his treatment of the patient, the doctor must be guided not simply by concern for the patient's biological existence but ultimately by concern for the dignity and integrity of his person. These qualities are founded in the patient's innate human freedom, which equally underlies his entitlement to life and to proper treatment without sacrifice of his right to self-determination, his inviolability and his human dignity. Self-determination presupposes the right to information and communication, and this in turn an obligation on the part of the doctor to talk in terms which the patient understands and to devote sufficient time to his needs. Respect for the inviolability of the patient's person implies not only his right to the security of confidentiality and discretion, but also his right, when receiving any form of treatment, to be acknowledged as a physiological, psychological and social entity with a concrete individuality. Human dignity, finally, implies the right of each individual to be the real "raison d'être" for any treatment to which he is subjected. Beyond this, a right to health can only exist in the negative sense of the right not to be made avoidably ill by the social order, and a right to sickness only in the restricted sense of not being put at a social disadvantage as the result of a medically diagnosed illness.