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Social Support: From Exclusion Criteria to Medical Service

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 February 2023

Jacob M. Appel Open the ORCID record for Jacob M. Appel [Opens in a new window]
Jacob M. Appel*
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, New York, USA Department of Psychiatry, Mount Sinai Health System, New York, New York, USA
*
Emails: jacobmappel@gmail.com; jacob.appel@mssm.edu
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Abstract

One of the criteria used by many transplant centers in assessing psychosocial eligibility for solid organ transplantation is social support. Yet, social support is a highly controversial requirement that has generated ongoing debate between ethicists and clinicians who favor its consideration (i.e., utility maximizers) and those who object to its use on equity grounds (i.e., equity maximizers). The assumption underlying both of these approaches is that social support is not a commodity that can be purchased in the marketplace. This essay argues for the reconceptualization of social support as a product that can—and should—be purchased for transplant candidates to render them eligible for transplant.

Keywords

transplantsocial supportequitysolid organ transplantpsychosocial evaluation
Type
Research Article
Information
Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics , Volume 33 , Issue 1 , January 2024 , pp. 17 - 22
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press

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References

Notes

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