The Healer's Power

Howard Brody

Published by Yale University Press 1992

The Healer's Power

Howard Brody

https://doi.org/10.12987/9780300156966

Overview
Contents

About this book

Although the physician’s use and misuse of power have been discussed in the social sciences and in literature, they have never been explored in medical ethics until now. In this book, Dr. Howard Brody argues that the central task is not to reduce the physician’s power, as others have suggested, but to develop guidelines for its use, so that the doctor shares with the patient both information and the responsibility for deciding on appropriate treatment.

Dr. Brody first reviews literary works dealing with medical power, from Dostoevsky’s “The Grand Inquisitor” to stories by William Carlos Williams, Vonda McIntyre, and Richard Selzer. These works, he shows, reveal the healers’ ambivalence over their own powers and patients’ fears of the abuse of power. Dr. Brody then points out important but neglected ethical issues that emerge from an analysis of power, such as the tension between care of individual patients and the pressures of the doctor’s workload; the rescue fantasy that impels some physicians to extraordinary lengths to save a life; and the economic system, which rewards surgeons and other specialists more than it does physicians who spend time talking with patients about their problems. He also shows how the perspective of shared power can shed new light on standard topics in medical ethics—from informed consent and confidentiality to resource allocation and cost containment.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
CONTENTS Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Preface and Acknowledgments Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
1 The Chief of Medicine Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
2 Medical Ethics and Power Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	12
3 The Dark Side of the Force: Clinical Examples Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	26
4 The Physician-Patient Relationship Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	44
5 Care versus Work Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	66
6 Informed Consent: Definition and Models Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	83
7 Informed Consent: Shared Power and Transparency Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	103
8 The Power to Control Information Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	120
9 The Rescue Fantasy Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	137
10 Substituted Judgment and Quality of Life Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	157
11 The Power to Determine Futility Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	173
12 Power and Cost Containment Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	186
13 The Physician's Income Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	208
14 The Social Power of Expert Healers Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	221
15 Power and Theories of Medical Ethics Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	238
16 The Physician's Character Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	253
17 Concluding Remarks Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	268
Appendix. "Of Mist, and Grass, and Sand," Vonda McIntyre Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	273
References Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	292
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	307

Language: English
Publisher: Yale University Press

eBook

Published: June 7, 2022
ISBN: 9780300156966