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Yes it does.
So you couldn't answer a simple question. There MUST be SOME statistics on it SOMEWHERE!!
I'll try and find some......
Well I think I have
You are talking about two completely different sets of circumstances there Becky. If you doctor said to you that you mother nad grandmother had breast cancer - and neither of them had told you - then he would have breached confidentiality. In the circumstances you are talking about the routine screening comes about (usually) because you have told him about your family history or because he has cleared things with your family first.
In the legal case in question, the doctors had no reason to inform his partner. First because under Aussie law he has a duty to tell her (I believe) and secondly because he has the right to privacy.
If you believe that she should have been told to protect her from harm then you have to consider the implications of that...
Example. There is a bug (known by the tabloids as a "superbug") called MRSA and it's prevalent in hospitals. Mainly because the public bring it in without realising. You could be a carrier and yet this bug will not infect you, however there are some people who are suseptible to this bug and it can kill. before you have an operation you will be screened for infection, if you have it we take precautions but it is still possible that you can pass it on. So, should we tell everyone else on the ward that you have it? To protect them from potential infection?
I'm sorry to say that confidentiality is sacrosanct and must stay that way if the health service is to operate effectively. There are NO circumstances where this trust between doctor and patient should be put in peril.
perhaps another example is a young girl wanting an abortion, or the pill, without parental knowledge. Or even a wife who wants an abortion without her husband's knowledge. In each of those cases I could put forward a strong case for confidentiality not being applied, but I truly believe in it's value even then.
~~~~~~~~
Now, about monocrat's comments. I think I'll surprise you by saying that I agree with him - to an extent - difference being that I have sympathy with people who are suffering regardless of how they contracted the disease. The vast majority of sufferers have contracted this disease through their own actions. Just as smokers will contract lung cancer, drinkers liver damage and people who masturbate will go blind (okay the last one is a myth. I hope). AIDS (or rather HIV) is contracted - in the majority of cases - through intravenous drug use, or unprotected sex. In either case precautions are easily and readily available and to be honest there is little excuse for not using them.
In this case, I think that the woman is extremely unfortunate and I don't think that she could be blamed in any way. She has trusted the man she loved, just in the way you would expect her to. Had it been a one night stand I might have felt differently.
Where I think she has gone wrong is by chasing the doctors and not the real culprit in this case.
Thank you MOK, I knew you could do it
Can a young girl have an abortion without parental consent? and if so, i thought the forms had to be signed by the legal guardian?what age would you be talking about?
Nope. Which is why I said "to an extent".
He's a moron and needs help.
Yes she can.
Consent can be given at any age, provided that the doctor believes that the patient understands the potential risks of the procedure. So, it happens that a teenage girl can have an abortion without their parents knowledge... or should I say that they do...
It also happens that someone with limited mental capacity cannot be asked to consent to an operation regardless of their age. For the same reason.
HIV Stats
"Judge Jerrold Cripps ruled the two doctors should have warned the woman's fiancé he would be breaking the law if he did not tell her he had HIV."
Note: fiancé. It looks more like a technicality, because the doctors would have been covered if they had followed procedure. Whether the fiancé was prosecuted, as he should surely have been, is undisclosed.
And it simply proves that the majority get HIV/AIDS of their own actions.
I thought a GP or health care professional could disclose confidential information when the patiets life was in danger, regardless of wheter they were unconcious etc?
Eg. High risk of suicide.
Well who signs the consent forms? if they are a minor then its supposed to be their parent/legal guardian.
Also god forbid anyhing happened during the operation where would the parents stand? Especially when they wouldnt have known that she was in hospital in the first place.
Doctors can perform an abortion for a girl under 16 if they feel that she is capable of giving informed consent and that it is in her best interests. They're encouaged to tell their parents, but they do not have to if they are believed to be competent enough to make their own choice.
Thanks for that
They DO deserve what they get.
I trust you will fully agree with the above and happily admit that they also deserved what they got.
Aladdin has made an excellent point.
If you read this thread, you'd realise that I had stated that I possessed sympathy for those who had cancer. In some cases it is genetic and it can spontaenously develop in others.
AIDS is different. It cannot be passed down through generations and does not spontaenously develop.
- babies born with the HIV virus acquired from their mothers?
- medical staff infected by accident (it happens)?
- patients infected by contaminated blood transfusions?
To name but three groups...
Not that those who catch it through drug use or sexual intercourse don't deserve sympathy though. That is at least what human beings usually think.
Do you know of any child who was killed by a car while playing on the street? Or a person who's fallen to their deaths from a height? Or a driver who crashed his car in rainy conditions? Why don't you go ahead and tell the families of such victims that they don't get your sympathy and that they got what they deserved for being careless?
Do you suffer from some kind of mental/emotional condition or have your deeply misguided ultra-selfish political beliefs affected your mind in some other fashion?
But the majority contract HIV of their own actions.
As a 'human being' I think I am entitled to the view that HIV sufferers DON'T deserve sympathy.
I probably would. Why not?
OK then Mr. Frued, I suffer from no 'mental/emotional condition'.
I probably wouldn't feel any sympathy for those who got shot for protesting. They would have got what they deserved for daring to "own" property and not sharing all their possessions and earnings with their fellow men. I trust you woudn't see any problem in my supporting of such measures.
something like that, its not life threatening, whereasthough this is. This woman is now going to lose her life because of something the doctor kept from her, and fair enough, you can argue on the side of the husband... but then again you could just get him done for manslaughter when the woman dies. I dont know cuz I dont know the legalities, but it doesnt seem right that if a doctor thinks someones life is in danger they can intervene (sp) (as i said about the child abuse or anything), and i cant see how the doctor didnt think this woman's life was in danger?
Well I might have a problem with your view since I believe in a person's right to own property.