Real-Life Decision Making
Sometimes medical professionals have to make very difficult choices and
decisions. You are facing one now.
As the discharge coordinator at a pediatric hospital, you are doing the
discharge planning for a little girl with a terminal illness. Everyone on
your team knows that further treatments will not help the little girl. You
believe that the best thing would be for the doctor to tell the parents the
truth, and send the girl home with medications that will make her as comfortable
as possible until the end comes.
However, looking at the chart, you notice that the doctor has left orders
for medications and other treatments for the parents to administer to the
child at home. These treatments will not help her recover -- her disease has
progressed too far. They will give the parents a false sense of hope. They
will also give the girl side effects that will make her more
uncomfortable than she needs to be.
You understand why the doctor has done this. Like most people, he does
not want to be the one to tell the parents that their child cannot recover.
He finds it easier to continue to prescribe treatments and avoid the pain
of telling the parents that nothing can be done.
You can't alter the doctor's instructions without his permission.
You also cannot talk to the parents about the situation without consulting
the doctor first. Your only approach is to ask the doctor to reconsider. If
you do this, he might listen, but he also might become very angry with you.
What do you do?