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Ethics for surgeons during the COVID-19 pandemic, review article

The Covid-19 pandemic is a devastating global healthcare emergency with seismic impact on how modern surgical services function. Surgeons worry, that whilst healthcare-resources are directed against the pandemic, double effect may predict these benevolent public health efforts will cause unintended...

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Autor principal: Harkin, Denis W.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Elsevier 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7278633/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32537140
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.amsu.2020.06.003
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author Harkin, Denis W.
author_facet Harkin, Denis W.
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description The Covid-19 pandemic is a devastating global healthcare emergency with seismic impact on how modern surgical services function. Surgeons worry, that whilst healthcare-resources are directed against the pandemic, double effect may predict these benevolent public health efforts will cause unintended maleficent effects through delays to surgical treatment. Surgeons will make many challenging ethical judgements during this pandemic, here we conduct a narrative review of how medical ethics may help us make the best available choices. A narrative review of all the relevant papers known to the author was conducted. We discuss the key aspects of medical ethics, and how they have applied to surgeons during the Covid-19 pandemic. The four fundamental principles of medical ethics include: Beneficence, Nonmaleficence, Autonomy and Justice. Surgeons will face many decisions which shall challenge those ethical principles during the pandemic, and wisdom from medical ethics can guide surgeons, to do the right thing, make best available choices, and get the best available outcome for patients during the Covid-19 pandemic. The practice of surgery is distinguished by good judgement in the face of uncertainty, we must strive to do the right thing, advocate for our patients, and be honest in the face of uncertainty. Medical Ethics can guide us to make the best available choices for our patients during the Covid-19 pandemic, afterwards, we must emerge wiser having learnt lessons and rebuilding trust in surgical care.
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spelling pubmed-72786332020-06-09 Ethics for surgeons during the COVID-19 pandemic, review article Harkin, Denis W. Ann Med Surg (Lond) Review Article The Covid-19 pandemic is a devastating global healthcare emergency with seismic impact on how modern surgical services function. Surgeons worry, that whilst healthcare-resources are directed against the pandemic, double effect may predict these benevolent public health efforts will cause unintended maleficent effects through delays to surgical treatment. Surgeons will make many challenging ethical judgements during this pandemic, here we conduct a narrative review of how medical ethics may help us make the best available choices. A narrative review of all the relevant papers known to the author was conducted. We discuss the key aspects of medical ethics, and how they have applied to surgeons during the Covid-19 pandemic. The four fundamental principles of medical ethics include: Beneficence, Nonmaleficence, Autonomy and Justice. Surgeons will face many decisions which shall challenge those ethical principles during the pandemic, and wisdom from medical ethics can guide surgeons, to do the right thing, make best available choices, and get the best available outcome for patients during the Covid-19 pandemic. The practice of surgery is distinguished by good judgement in the face of uncertainty, we must strive to do the right thing, advocate for our patients, and be honest in the face of uncertainty. Medical Ethics can guide us to make the best available choices for our patients during the Covid-19 pandemic, afterwards, we must emerge wiser having learnt lessons and rebuilding trust in surgical care. Elsevier 2020-06-08 /pmc/articles/PMC7278633/ /pubmed/32537140 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.amsu.2020.06.003 Text en © 2020 The Author http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Review Article
Harkin, Denis W.
Ethics for surgeons during the COVID-19 pandemic, review article
title Ethics for surgeons during the COVID-19 pandemic, review article
title_full Ethics for surgeons during the COVID-19 pandemic, review article
title_fullStr Ethics for surgeons during the COVID-19 pandemic, review article
title_full_unstemmed Ethics for surgeons during the COVID-19 pandemic, review article
title_short Ethics for surgeons during the COVID-19 pandemic, review article
title_sort ethics for surgeons during the covid-19 pandemic, review article
topic Review Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7278633/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32537140
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.amsu.2020.06.003
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