During a pandemic, physicians may experience tension between their ethical responsibilities and their legal rights and duties. For example, the Code of Ethics states that physicians have a fundamental ethical responsibility to “consider the patient`s well-being first,” but also to “promote and maintain their own health and well-being.” 24 Some colleges have described the ethical dilemmas that can arise during a pandemic and have produced policy statements specifically related to physicians` ethical obligations.27-29 The issues become more complicated when considering physicians` legal due diligence and their legal right to refuse to work in unsafe conditions. Physicians should be aware that the existence of this separate regulatory system does not deny their right to refuse to work in hazardous conditions, nor does it protect them from negligent liability for a breach of their legal duty of care. Legal scholars suggest that due diligence includes several catalogued tasks: care, diagnosis, referral, treatment, and patient instruction.1 If a physician violates the duty of care and a patient suffers an injury as a result, the physician may be found negligent and forced to pay financial compensation to the injured patient or family.3 Professional insurance may cover these costs.4 Employers are required, under human rights law, to try to provide workers with particular vulnerabilities.15 An employer who refuses may be found to be discriminatory on the basis of sex (if pregnancy is the source of susceptibility) or disability (if an underlying condition is the source of susceptibility). What counts as sufficient accommodation depends on the individual case. Human rights laws require concessions to the point of undue hardship – that is, employers must be prepared to endure some degree of hardship,16 such as creating a new position or transferring another worker.17 Regardless of a legal obligation to care for a person who is not a patient, a doctor chooses to help a person in an emergency. He may have established a physician-patient relationship and thus assumed the resulting responsibility.3 Liability may be limited by the Good Samaritan Act which exists in all provinces except New Brunswick. This law stipulates that doctors who provide assistance at the scene of an emergency and without expecting compensation will only be held liable if they commit gross negligence. Home > Answers > Health Insurance Reform> What are my health care rights and obligations? Only provincial and federal laws designed to protect the health of workers are likely to be considered to establish acceptable health and safety standards.21 Hazards that persist after compliance with these standards are likely to be considered normal working conditions.
Physicians should likely demonstrate a significant change in circumstances to make it clear that once acceptable safety standards are now a danger.22 Due to legal uncertainty about physicians` rights and obligations during a pandemic, physicians should not unrealistically rely on existing laws or jurisprudence. We cannot delude ourselves into believing that doctors have absolute autonomy in the work they choose, or that they can be forced to work in all circumstances. Physicians need to be aware of the evolution of legal developments and ethical discourse. The nature of rights and obligations in different contexts is influenced by ethical, professional and legal cooperation. Physicians must work with healthcare institutions, regulators and the public to ensure that those working during a pandemic feel safe and ready to work. If you accidentally placed the card in the wrong field, simply click on the card to remove it from the box. Ethical, professional and legal cooperation is needed to address the tensions between the legal rights and duties of physicians and their ethical responsibilities. Some physicians have the right to refuse to work if they can meet the four criteria set by labour authorities in Canada. An important right of the patient is informed consent. This means that if you need treatment, your doctor will need to give you the information you need to make a decision.
The oath that doctors take is, “First, don`t do any harm,” not “Worry about patient satisfaction first,” says Dr. Lasanta Horana. Would it not be good if rights and obligations were balanced? We have responsibilities to health care workers and patients` rights, so why not the rights of health care workers and the duties of patients? Lyncean Ung, Steve Sattler and Maria Segerivas treat a patient with neck pain more than it seems.