Pulling the plug on futility.

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

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.

The trial behind it

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.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

Who cites it

17 citing papers in PubMed.

1. Doctors Are Inconsistent in Estimating Survival after CPR and Are Not Using Such Predictions Consistently in Determining DNACPR Decisions.Geriatrics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2019
   Article
2. Medical indication regarding life-sustaining treatment for children: Focus groups with clinicians.Palliative medicine · 2016
   Article
3. End-of-life decisions in intensive care medicine-shared decision-making and intensive care unit length of stay.World journal of surgery · 2015
   Observational
4. Beyond the futility argument: the fair process approach and time-limited trials for managing dialysis conflict.Clinical journal of the American Society of Nephrology : CJASN · 2013
   Review
5. Evaluating a patient's request for life-prolonging treatment: an ethical framework.Journal of medical ethics · 2012
   Article
6. Too much of a good thing is wonderful? A conceptual analysis of excessive examinations and diagnostic futility in diagnostic radiology.Medicine, health care, and philosophy · 2010
   Article
7. Legal and institutional fictions in medical ethics: a common, and yet largely overlooked, phenomenon.Journal of medical ethics · 2007
   Review
8. Perceptions of patients on the utility or futility of end-of-life treatment.Journal of medical ethics · 2006
   Article
9. Bioethics for clinicians: 16. Dealing with demands for inappropriate treatment.CMAJ : Canadian Medical Association journal = journal de l'Association medicale canadienne · 1998
   Review
10. Cardiopulmonary resuscitation for patients in a persistent vegetative state: futile or acceptable?CMAJ : Canadian Medical Association journal = journal de l'Association medicale canadienne · 1998
    Review
11. Resuscitation decisions in the elderly: a discussion of current thinking.Journal of medical ethics · 1996
    Review
12. On withholding artificial hydration and nutrition from terminally ill sedated patients. The debate continues.Journal of medical ethics · 1996
    Article
13. Health care rationing. Who will be patients' advocate if doctors assume the rationing role?BMJ (Clinical research ed.) · 1996
    Article
14. Consensus finally achieved on resuscitative interventions.CMAJ : Canadian Medical Association journal = journal de l'Association medicale canadienne · 1995
    Article
15. Discussing cardiopulmonary resuscitation with patients and relatives.Postgraduate medical journal · 1995
    Review
16. Ethics and economics of health care. British medicine has lessons for North American medicine.BMJ (Clinical research ed.) · 1995
    Article
17. Ethics and economics of health care. Prognosis, a traditional alternative to futility.BMJ (Clinical research ed.) · 1995
    Article

Corrections and comments

• Commented on by
  Ethics and economics of health care. Prognosis, a traditional alternative to futility.1995
• Commented on by
  Ethics and economics of health care. British medicine has lessons for North American medicine.1995

Authors and funding

2 authors.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

Abstract

PubMed holds no abstract for this paper.

Indexed as