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Doctors' legal position in treating temporarily incompetent patients
D W Hodgkinson1, A J Gray, B Dalal
1Stockport Acute Services NHS Trust, Stockport Infirmary.
BMJ (Clinical Research Ed.)
|July 8, 1995
Abstract:
Doctors in accident and emergency departments are sometimes presented with patients with potentially life threatening conditions who refuse to consent to treatment. The doctors then face a dilemma: to withhold necessary treatment or to act against a patient's express wishes. Two such cases are presented, and we asked a lawyer, two medical ethicists, a psychiatrist, and an accident and emergency physician to comment on the implications.