Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- List of contributors
- Prologue. Breaking the silence
- Letter from a young doctor
- Part I On caring for patients
- Section 2 Problems in truth-telling
- Section 3 Setting boundaries
- Part II On becoming a “team player”: searching for esprit de corps and conflicts of socialization
- Section 5 Argot, jargon, and questionable humor: assuming the mantle at the patient's expense
- Section 6 Making waves: questioning authority and the status quo
- Section 7 Perceiving misconduct and whistle-blowing: observing peers or superiors commit an act deemed unethical
- 21 Abusing alcohol or drugs
- 22 Mistreating patients: nasty, rude, or hostile behavior toward patients
- 23 Covering up
- 24 Misrepresenting research
- Epilogue: Using this book
- Glossary
- Index
23 - Covering up
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 February 2015
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- List of contributors
- Prologue. Breaking the silence
- Letter from a young doctor
- Part I On caring for patients
- Section 2 Problems in truth-telling
- Section 3 Setting boundaries
- Part II On becoming a “team player”: searching for esprit de corps and conflicts of socialization
- Section 5 Argot, jargon, and questionable humor: assuming the mantle at the patient's expense
- Section 6 Making waves: questioning authority and the status quo
- Section 7 Perceiving misconduct and whistle-blowing: observing peers or superiors commit an act deemed unethical
- 21 Abusing alcohol or drugs
- 22 Mistreating patients: nasty, rude, or hostile behavior toward patients
- 23 Covering up
- 24 Misrepresenting research
- Epilogue: Using this book
- Glossary
- Index
Summary
To acknowledge?
CASE
“The camouflaged patient”
I was on a surgical rotation and the patient was an elderly woman who had developed a severe postoperative infection after undergoing a cholecystostomy. The surgical residents were terrorized as to what the attending physicians would say on rounds. In an attempt to camouflage the patient's condition, the residents staged a scene in which they propped her up with pillows and put a breakfast tray in front of her to make her look better than she really was.
CASE
“Didn't you write that order?”
A very sick patient on the cardiac care unit was waiting for a heart transplant. Hospital routine was such that, beginning on Thursday, residents or interns on call left the care of their patients to others over the weekend, often during critical periods of hospitalization. As an intern, it fell to me to cover this particular cardiac patient for another intern on his weekend off.
Before he signed out, the intern stated his concern that despite high doses of potassium the patient's level remained low. Because there was no apparent renal insufficiency, I decided to increase the potassium dose and scheduled a dose of 3 times a day, assuming it would be monitored in my absence. The next morning the level was normal, so I continued him on that dose.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Ward EthicsDilemmas for Medical Students and Doctors in Training, pp. 231 - 247Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2001