Although technology exists to sustain vital functions of almost any patient, not every pulse-less patient is a candidate for resuscitation. Criteria needs to be developed to guide health care professionals in identifying ...

OBJECTIVE: To review our experience with semen retrieval in men who are incompetent or dead and to formulate general medical, legal, and ethical guidelines for practitioners. DESIGN: Case series and literature review. ...

OBJECTIVE: To examine the anticipated decisions to consent to or to forgo life-sustaining treatment by spouses of patients with Alzheimer's disease and to describe the relationship of spouse and patient characteristics to ...

Harris argues that if QALYs are used only 50% of the population will be eligible for survival, whereas if random methods of allocation are used 100% will be eligible. We argue that this involves an equivocation in the ...

This paper makes the assumption that organ transplantation is, under some conditions at least, a proper use of communal medical resources. Proceeding from this assumption, the author: (1) sketches the history of the problem; ...

BACKGROUND: Serious illness often causes economic hardship for patients' families. However, it is not known whether this hardship is associated with a preference for the goal of care to focus on maximizing comfort instead ...

OBJECTIVE: To assess patients' willingness to accept life-sustaining treatment when the expected outcome is a diminished mental health state. DESIGN: Structured interviews with a consecutive series of patients. SETTING: A ...

Normative criteria adopted to assure just, equitable, and efficient allocation of donor organs to potential recipients has been widely praised as a model for the allocation of scarce medical resources. Because the ...