ArticleBMC medical ethics2024
A review of clinical ethics consultations in a regional healthcare system over a two-year timeframe.
Article in BMC medical ethics, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed.
- Relevance of clinical ethics support services in specialized outpatient palliative care teams and inpatient hospices.BMC palliative care · 2026Article
- Ethical Decision-Making and Clinical Ethics Support in Italian Neonatal Intensive Care Units: Results from a National Survey.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Disentangling the configurational drivers of nursing science popularization: a fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis using WeChat data.BMC nursing · 2025Article
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundClinical Ethics Consultations (CECs) are used by healthcare systems to offer healthcare practitioners a structured level of support to approach ethical questions. The objective of this study was to detail the elements of surveyed CECs and offer guidance in the approach to future ethics consultations at a regional healthcare system.
methodsThis cohort study has a qualitative and quantitative retrospective approach, surveying ethics consultations through the dates of 4/27/22 to 4/26/24. A documentary sheet was created, and information was entered via online data-gathering forms. The cases are from a range of specialties within a regional healthcare system servicing Minnesota, Wisconsin, and North Dakota.
results103 CECs were performed within the study period across the regional healthcare system. Consultations were identified through retrospective review of the internal CEC database, and patient information was collected through the medical record. Decision-making was often performed by a substitute decision-maker (N = 54), occurring in 70.1% of cases with known decision makers. CECs were documented in an ethics-specific note in the patient medical record in 37 of 82 (45.1%) documented patient cases. It was common for physicians to mention the ethics consultation in their patient notes, occuring in 51 of 82 (62.2%) of documented patient cases. Age was recorded in 92.0% (N = 91) of unique patient cases; the median age was 62 years. Ethical questions concerning end-of-life care were the most common cause for consultation (N = 35, 34%), and CECs were most commonly requested in general medicine or hospitalist departments (N = 38, 45.2%). Most consultations resulted in resolution at time of initial consultation with the ethics call team.
conclusionsRecommendations for increased frequency and timing of policy review are given based on the results of the data presented. Using interpretation of the CECs in this study, we offer recommendations towards the use and documentation of ethics consultations in the era of open notes, open the door towards areas of future research, and ultimately promote use of CECs for more favorable patient outcomes.
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