Doctors should no longer tell patients which medical treatments they need to have and must instead set out the options and let people decide for themselves, according to guidelines published today.
In an attempt to avoid hospitals being sued, doctors are being told to stop treating patients with a “paternalistic” attitude and to let them make their own decisions about treatments.
In a shift away from the “doctor knows best” culture, the Royal College of Surgeons (RCS) has released new guidelines which say that clinicians should take patients through every possible option – even if they believe some will have disadvantages.
It comes after a Supreme Court judgment awarded a diabetic mother £5 million after her baby was born with disabilities because, she claimed, medics failed to advise her of the risks of natural birth over a caesarean.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/201...nows-best-as-medics-are-told-to-let-patients/
In an attempt to avoid hospitals being sued, doctors are being told to stop treating patients with a “paternalistic” attitude and to let them make their own decisions about treatments.
In a shift away from the “doctor knows best” culture, the Royal College of Surgeons (RCS) has released new guidelines which say that clinicians should take patients through every possible option – even if they believe some will have disadvantages.
It comes after a Supreme Court judgment awarded a diabetic mother £5 million after her baby was born with disabilities because, she claimed, medics failed to advise her of the risks of natural birth over a caesarean.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/201...nows-best-as-medics-are-told-to-let-patients/
