IMA moots ethics code overhaul

IMA moots ethics code overhaul

News:

1.Indian Medical Association redefining Medical Ethics Codes.

Important Facts

2.Indian Medical Association is in the process of redefining the code of Ethics and it has recommended advertisement by doctors and mandatory cadaver organ donation.

3. Cadaver Donation:

• An organ or part of an organ given at the time of donor’s death. (Cadaver means corpse)
• Cadaver organ donations are currently carried out in India only when an individual has explicitly expressed a wish to donate or with the consent of immediate relatives in cases of brain death

4. Why we need overhauling in Medical Ethics Codes

Medical ethics focused on the moral responsibility of a physician was not adequate to address the ethical, moral and societal issues such as:

• Unregulated mechanism for drug pricing.
• Unregulated cost of transplant surgeries; cost out of reach of poor people
• Increasing Cost of treatment, disease burden, and the poor public health care facilities, the moral and ethical discussion on the “right to live” assumes a greater significance in India.
• Religious beliefs hinder deceased organ donation.
• Todays in advancing world, rather than surgeons, robots are operating on people, so it was imperative that medical ethics should be redefine.
• Financial conflict between patient and private sector further deprive citizens and clearly visible area of ethical conflict.
• Failing Doctors and Hospital to make poor citizen aware of Insurance and other social benefit scheme which further deprive them to avail quality healthcare services.
• There is a need to expand the scope of the definition of ethics within the field of medicine due to increasing number of stakeholder’s participation in the Industry.

5. Issues with current medical ethics.

• The current code of medical ethics by the Medical Council of India dates back to 2002 and do no address the current challenges.
• Ethical issues around Assisted Reproductive Technology (Fertility Treatment) and surrogacy.
• Lack of ethically driven programme that can increase the numbers of organs without exploitation of the poverty-stricken donors.
• Recently there is a move by some physicians and policy makers in India to look at the possibility of making kidney sale a legal transaction.
• However, financial incentives for organ donation is likely to only lead to more exploitation of low income group people.
• Code has fail to check the involvement of middle man which further add the value in the cost of organ transplantation.
• Fail to address Doctors’ engagement in organ transplant business, curing rich patients in India and Middle East.
• Fail to address advertisement and publicity by big hospitals.
• In the present scenario Medical Ethics fail to provide an effective mechanism to resolve Financial Insolvency cases.

6. Recommendation if Indian Medical Council

• Mandatory cadaver organ donation to reduce leading cause of exploitation of poor.
• Publicity or advertising material needs to be ethical.
• Medical ethics should be part of the entire curriculum of medical students so that they are familiarized with the role of ethics in the changing scenario.
• The need for introducing ethical training in the undergraduate and postgraduate medical training.
• Need to build high public trust in their respective nationalized health schemes like Europe.