Medical Ethics: A Consideration Over DNR, Essay Example

Medical practitioners are commissioned to save the lives of patients as the primary course of their function as healthcare providers. Nevertheless, there are instances that this particular function is being challenged by particular rules that were made recognizable through legal assumptions of medical conditions that are assumed for better understanding on how the decisions of individuals ought to be respected accordingly. Among the considerations noted in relation to medical ethics is the recognition of the DNR rule which indicates how patients opt to be not treated instead of being further medically managed [especially if they view their situation to be terminal and unresolvable].

What does a doctor do when such situation arise? There are instances when a doctor is left with no choice as further medical applications may only provide temporary relief to the situation but would later on lose its effect on the patient causing more pain and other side effects of the medication in the long run. However, in times when a new diagnosis has been found under a doctor’s management, there are instances when new procedures are found and new treatments are seen to have a better impact on the health of the patient. In this case, would it be better for the doctor to relieve the DNR order and follow his instincts and the desire to be able to save the life of his patient? There were cases in the past that determine the accusation against doctors who did not recognize the power of DNR for the sake of saving the life of the patient. What do these cases say about the importance of DNR and how it challenges medical ethics? This topic would be able to create a more instinctive process of determining the real value of the oath that medical practitioners take in general.

References

Eckberg, Evelyn (April 1998). “The continuing ethical dilemma of the do-not-resuscitate order“. AORN Journal.

Ehlenbach WJ, Barnato AE, Curtis JR, et al. (July 2009). “Epidemiologic study of in-hospital cardiopulmonary resuscitation in the elderly”. N. Engl. J. Med. 361 (1): 22–31.