45. Medical ethics PROFESSIONAL ENGLISH IN USE FOR MEDICINE

PROFESSIONAL ENGLISH IN USE FOR MEDICINE

45. Medical ethics

A	GMC guidelines The duties of a doctor registered with the General Medical Council include: 1 Make the care of your patient your first concern. 2 Treat every patient politely and considerately. 3 Give patients information in a way they can understand. 4 Keep your professional knowledge and skills up to date. 5 Recognize the limits of your professional competence. 6 Be honest and trustworthy. 7 Respect and protect confidential information. 8 Make sure that your personal beliefs do not prejudice your patients’ care. 9 Act quickly to protect patients from risk if you have good reason to believe that you or your colleague may not be fit to practice.
B	Bioethical issues Euthanasia Should the medical profession help the terminally ill to end their lives when they choose? Genetic engineering Should we permit an embryo to be cloned - copied – exactly to replace a child who has died? Should parents be able to select the genetic makeup of their children to produce so-called designer babies? Human fertility IVF – in vitro fertilization – has made it possible for infertile women to have children, but should this include women long past the normal age of childbearing? Embryos can be frozen and implanted in the mother at a later date but should this require the consent or permission of both parents if the marriage has broken down? What are the rights of a surrogate mother, one who carries a child for a woman who is unable to do so, over that child? Transplant surgery Who should give consent for the removal of body parts for transplant surgery.
C	Assisted dying A medical student has made some language notes on a journal article.
D

EXERCISES

45.1	Which of the GMC guidelines in A above is breached in each of these cases? a A GP falls asleep regularly during consultations. His colleagues do nothing. b A doctor is aware that a patient has history of violence against women. She informs a friend whose daughter has just become engaged to this man. c A doctor attempts to dissuade a patient from having an abortion as this procedure is against his religious beliefs. d A doctor refers a patient to a medical textbook for an explanation of his pancreatic cancer. f A doctor fails to complete the number of days of professional development training advised annually. g A doctor tells a seriously overweight patient who has ignored his advice to diet that she deserves any ill effects that might result from her obesity.
45.2	Match each headline to an opening line from a newspaper report. Look at B and C above to help you. a A woman of 30 who agreed to bear a child for a childless couple then refused to part with the child has been …. b A surgeon has been accused of removing organs patients without their knowledge …. c Three-quarters of Belgian doctors are willing to assist in the death of critically ill babies to end their suffering. d A woman hoping to stop the destruction of six embryos created with her eggs and her ex-partner’s sperm launched a case at the European Court of Human Rights ….

Answer key