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Medicine and Health Sciences Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

2009

Law

Professional Ethics

Articles 1 - 3 of 3

Full-Text Articles in Medicine and Health Sciences

Prosecuting Doctors For Trusting Patients, Deborah Hellman Sep 2009

Prosecuting Doctors For Trusting Patients, Deborah Hellman

Deborah Hellman

In an escalating phase of our country’s war on drugs, doctors treating patients in pain are being prosecuted for drug trafficking under the Controlled Substances Act. While doctors surely can be guilty of drug trafficking when they sell drugs for money, lately some doctors have been prosecuted for violations of a statute that requires knowingly distributing or dispensing controlled substances in an unauthorized manner for simply being willfully blind to the fact that their patients were reselling the drugs. While willful blindness may be an apt substitute for knowledge in the traditional drug courier scenario, doctors in these cases are …


Evidence, Belief, And Action: The Failure Of Equipoise To Resolve The Ethical Tension In The Randomized Clinical Trial, Deborah Hellman Aug 2009

Evidence, Belief, And Action: The Failure Of Equipoise To Resolve The Ethical Tension In The Randomized Clinical Trial, Deborah Hellman

Deborah Hellman

No abstract provided.


"Let's Do The Time Warp Again": Assessing The Competence Of Counsel In Mental Health Conservatorship Proceedings, Grant H. Morris Jan 2009

"Let's Do The Time Warp Again": Assessing The Competence Of Counsel In Mental Health Conservatorship Proceedings, Grant H. Morris

Grant H Morris

Thirty years ago, I wrote an article on mental health conservatorships in California and the role of counsel for persons for whom a conservatorship has been proposed. Data was gathered on the performance of attorneys in court hearings conducted in San Diego County Superior Court. The data revealed that lawyers representing proposed conservatees were inactive and ineffective in representing their clients’ interests. The lawyers did not consider themselves advocates in an adversary process in which conservatorship was to be avoided. A year after the article was published, the California Supreme Court, citing that article as authority for the “paternalistic attitude” …