Frequency of Ethical Issues on a Hospitalist Teaching Service at an Urban, Tertiary Care Center.

TitleFrequency of Ethical Issues on a Hospitalist Teaching Service at an Urban, Tertiary Care Center.
Publication TypeJournal Article
Year of Publication2019
AuthorsMcCarthy MW, de Asua DReal, Gabbay E, Christos PJ, Fins JJ
JournalJ Hosp Med
Volume14
Issue5
Pagination290-293
Date Published2019 May
ISSN1553-5606
Abstract

Little is known about the daily ethical conflicts encountered by hospitalists that do not prompt a formal clinical ethics consultation. We describe the frequencies of ethical issues identified during daily rounds on hospitalist teaching services at a metropolitan, tertiary-care, teaching hospital. Data were collected from September 2017 through May 2018 by two attending hospitalists from the ethics committee who were embedded on rounds. A total of 270 patients were evaluated and 113 ethical issues were identified in 77 of those patients. These issues most frequently involved discussions about goals of care, treatment refusals, decision-making capacity, discharge planning, cardiopulmonary resuscitation status, and pain management. Only five formal consults were brought to the Hospital Ethics Committee for these 270 patients. Our data are the first prospective description of ethical issues arising on academic hospitalist teaching services and are an important step in the development of a targeted ethics curriculum for hospitalists.

DOI10.12788/jhm.3179
Alternate JournalJ Hosp Med
PubMed ID30897052
Division: 
Biostatistics
Category: 
Faculty Publication