ArticleClinical ethics2016
Empirical and philosophical analysis of physicians' judgments of medical indications.
Article in Clinical ethics, 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 9 papers.
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Who cites it
9 citing papers in PubMed, 17 citations in OpenAlex.
- Respecting the right to refuse: is decision-making capacity disproportionately challenged in patients declining medical care in order to treat?Journal of medical ethics · 2026Article
- An "ethics of strangers"? On knowing the patient in clinical ethics.Medicine, health care, and philosophy · 2024Article
- "Being prevented from providing good care: a conceptual analysis of moral stress among health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic".BMC medical ethics · 2023Article
- Value-impregnated factual claims may undermine medical decision-making.Clinical ethics · 2018Article
- "Right to recommend, wrong to require"- an empirical and philosophical study of the views among physicians and the general public on smoking cessation as a condition for surgery.BMC medical ethics · 2018Article
- Existential decision-making in a fatal progressive disease: how much do legal and medical frameworks matter?BMC palliative care · 2017Article
- Is healthcare providers' value-neutrality depending on how controversial a medical intervention is? Analysis of 10 more or less controversial interventions.Clinical ethics · 2017Article
- Value-impregnated factual claims and slippery-slope arguments.Medicine, health care, and philosophy · 2017Article
- Heed or disregard a cancer patient's critical blogging? An experimental study of two different framing strategies.BMC medical ethics · 2016Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundThe aim of this study was to investigate whether physicians who felt strongly for or against a treatment, in this case a moderately life prolonging non-curative cancer treatment, differed in their estimation of medical indication for this treatment as compared to physicians who had no such sentiment. A further aim was to investigate how the notion of medical indication was conceptualised.
methodsA random sample of GPs, oncologists and pulmonologists (n = 646) comprised the study group. Respondents were randomised to receive either version of a case presentation; in one version, the patient had smoked and in the other version she had never smoked. The physicians were labelled value-neutral (65%) and value-influenced (35%) on the basis of their attitude towards the treatment.
resultsIn the 'value-influenced' group, there was a significant difference in the estimation of medical indication for treatment depending upon whether the patient had smoked (50% (95% CI: 41-59) or never smoked (67% (95% CI: 58-76) (Chi-2 = 5.8, df = 1;
conclusionThis study shows that compared to value-neutral physicians, value-influenced physicians are more likely to base decisions of medical indication on medically irrelevant factors (in this case: the patient's smoking status). Moreover, medical indication is used in an ambiguous manner. Hence, we recommend that the usage of 'medical indication' be disciplined.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.