Medical studies without consent greenlighted
Medical experiments to be done without patients’ consent | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle
WASHINGTON — The federal government is undertaking the most ambitious set of studies ever mounted under a controversial arrangement that allows researchers to conduct some kinds of medical experiments without first getting the patients’ permission.The $50 million, five-year project, which will involve more than 20,000 patients in 11 sites in the United States and Canada, is designed to improve treatment after car accidents, shootings, cardiac arrest and other emergencies.
The three studies, organizers say, offer an unprecedented opportunity to find better ways to resuscitate people whose hearts suddenly stop, to stabilize patients who go into shock and to minimize damage from head injuries. Because such patients are usually unconscious at a time when every minute counts, it is often impossible to get consent from them or their families, the organizers say.
The project has been endorsed by many trauma experts and some bioethicists, but others question it. The harshest critics say the research violates fundamental ethical principles.
I am all for medical breakthroughs but somehow I don’t want them to be flipping a coin when I am in the middle of a medical crisis. They are rationalizing the studies by saying most patients would die anyway.
Medical experiments to be done without patients’ consent | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle
Some bioethicists say the new research is more ethical than some of the earlier studies in several ways, including that patients are not being denied highly effective therapies. Most patients who receive the current treatments do not survive.
So, since they will probably die anyway it doesn’t matter if we use them. That bothers me on so many levels. Dallas is the only place in Texas that is participating in these studies.
Medical experiments to be done without patients’ consent | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle
The studies are being conducted by the Resuscitation Outcomes Consortium, a network that includes medical centers in Seattle, Portland, San Diego, Dallas, Birmingham, Pittsburgh, Milwaukee, Toronto and Ottawa and around Iowa and British Columbia.
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