Comparing doctors’ legal compliance across three Australian states for decisions whether to withhold or withdraw life-sustaining medical treatment: does different law lead to different decisions?

Comparing doctors’ legal compliance across three Australian states for decisions whether to withhold or withdraw life-sustaining medical treatment: does different law lead to different decisions?

BACKGROUND Law purports to regulate end-of-life care but its role in decision-making by doctors is not clear. This paper, which is part of a three-year study into the role of law in medical practice at the end of life, investigates whether law affects doctors' decision-making. In particular, it considers whether the fact that the law differs across Australia's three largest states - New South W...

Physicians' decisions to withhold and withdraw life-sustaining treatment.

BACKGROUND Few data are available about physicians' decisions in regard to withholding or withdrawing life-sustaining measures. We therefore studied internists' views on this subject. METHODS We surveyed 1000 generalist and subspecialist internists about their views on withholding or withdrawing life-sustaining treatment. Thirty-two hypothetical cases were included. The effect of the demograp...

Interveners or Interferers: Intervention in Decisions to Withhold and Withdraw Life-Sustaining Medical Treatment

An important feature of our judicial system is the discretion a court has to allow an individual or (more usually) a group who is not a party to proceedings to intervene in a dispute between others. While historically it has been comparatively rare for a non-party to become involved in litigation, over the past fifteen years, courts appear to have become more willing to allow such intervention....

Futile or fruitful: the charter and the decision to withhold or withdraw life-sustaining treatment.

The parents' ability to take care of their baby as a factor in decisions to withhold or withdraw life-prolonging treatment in two Dutch NICUs.

In The Netherlands, it is openly acknowledged that the parents' ability to take care of their child plays a role in the decision-making process over administration of life-prolonging treatment to severely defective newborn babies. Unlike other aspects of such decision-making process up until the present time, the 'ability to take care' has not received specific attention in regulation or in emp...