Complexity of Clinical Decision Making: Consent, Capacity, and Ethics

Decision-making capacity for informed consent in the older population.

We discuss key concepts and review 12 published research studies relevant to informed consent and decision-making capacity in the older population. The literature suggests that aging is associated with impaired decision-making capacity; the following additional factors amplify the detrimental effect of aging: lower vocabulary level, lower educational level, chronic medical illness (as in nursin...

CLINICAL ETHICS Consent for anaesthesia

‘‘Informed consent’’ is a legal instrument that allows individuals to define their own interests and to protect their bodily privacy. In current medical practice, patients who have consented to surgery are considered to have implied consent to anaesthesia, even though anaesthesia is associated with its own particular set of risks and consequences that are quite separate from those associated wi...

Ethics of everyday decision making.

Evidence suggests that checklists can prevent episodes of patient harm and they are increasingly being used in patient care to ensure that procedures are being carried out. However, checklists cannot do so alone and in some situations the checklist might indicate that an intervention has been undertaken when it has not. Healthcare providers, particularly nurses, must consider not only the incre...

Leading Ethical Decision - Making : Clinical Ethics Services in Australia

Exclusionary Decision Making in Tehran Metropolitan Region- Complexity, Self organization and Power of Action

Viewing urban areas as webs of complex, interwoven networks, this article aims to analyze the decision-making process and its outcomes in Tehran metropolitan region. To do so, first the theoretical basis of complexity in urban life and its implications for planning have been reviewed. Using the main notion of power of action i.e. agency, and through creating the network of actors and their rela...