Telling the Truth to Patients: A Clinical Ethics Exploration

Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 3 (3):375 (1994)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

In this essay I will examine why the truth is so important to human communication in general, the types of truth, and why truth is only a relative value. After those introductory points, I will sketch the ways in which the truth is overridden or trumped by other concerns in the clinical setting. I will then discuss cases that fall into five distinct categories. The conclusion emphasizes the importance of truth telling and its primacy among secondary goods in the healthcare professional-patient relationship

Categories

Keywords

Reprint years

DOI

10.1017/s096318010000520x

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 91,322

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

My notes

Similar books and articles

On evoking clinical meaning.Richard Zaner - 2006 - Journal of Medicine and Philosophy 31 (6):655 – 666.
How should a nurse approach truth-telling? A virtue ethics perspective.Kate Hodkinson - 2008 - Nursing Philosophy 9 (4):248-256.
Truth telling in medicine: The confucian view.Ruiping Fan & Benfu Li - 2004 - Journal of Medicine and Philosophy 29 (2):179 – 193.
Truth-telling in health care.Anne Slowther - 2009 - Clinical Ethics 4 (4):173-175.
Would you like to know what is wrong with you? On telling the truth to patients with dementia.M. Marzanski - 2000 - Journal of Medical Ethics 26 (2):108-113.
Virtual ethics committee, case 1: should our hospital have a policy of telling patients about near misses?Heather Draper, Adam MacDiarmaid-Gordon, Laura Strumidlo, Bea Teuten & Eleanor Updale - 2006 - Clinical Ethics 1 (1):11-17.
Strengths and limitations of considering patients as ethics 'actors' equal to doctors: reflections on the patients' position in a French clinical ethics consultation setting.Eirini Rari & Véeronique Fournier - 2009 - Clinical Ethics 4 (3):152-155.
Moral obligations of patients: A clinical view.Dan C. English - 2005 - Journal of Medicine and Philosophy 30 (2):139 – 152.
The truth-telling issue and changes in lifestyle in patients with cancer.V. Kostopoulou & K. Katsouyanni - 2006 - Journal of Medical Ethics 32 (12):693-697.
“Hello, hello—it's English I speak!”: a qualitative exploration of patients' understanding of the science of clinical trials.M. Stead - 2005 - Journal of Medical Ethics 31 (11):664-669.
Truth telling as reparations.Margaret Urban Walker - 2010 - Metaphilosophy 41 (4):525-545.
Truth-telling in the doctor–patient relationship: a case analysis.Daniel K. Sokol - 2006 - Clinical Ethics 1 (3):130-134.
The protection of patients' rights in clinical trials.Marek Czarkowski - 2006 - Science and Engineering Ethics 12 (1):131-138.
The Antinomies of Impure Reason: Rousseau and Kant on the Metaphysics of Truth‐Telling.Rebecca Kukla - 2005 - Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy 48 (3):203 – 231.

Analytics

Added to PP
2010-08-24

Downloads
357 (#54,003)

6 months
16 (#149,874)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Citations of this work

Paradigms for Clinical Ethics Consultation Practice.Mark D. Fox, Glenn Mcgee & Arthur Caplan - 1998 - Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics 7 (3):308-314.

Add more citations

References found in this work

Add more references