Study-Unit Description

Study-Unit Description


CODE LAS1057

 
TITLE The Medico-Legal Conundrum: Action and Reaction

 
UM LEVEL I - Introductory Level

 
MQF LEVEL 5

 
ECTS CREDITS 4

 
DEPARTMENT Centre for the Liberal Arts and Sciences

 
DESCRIPTION This Unit focuses on the interface between medicine and the law. From the early days of ancient Babylon, society has recognised the law as an instrument, initially of punishment and later as a means of redress for medical liability of negligence. Borrowing from examples of actual case law, this Unit considers the course of evolution of this aspect of the Law in general, and the development of medico-legal principles and dynamics of litigation. The Unit also traces the scientific thinking of the 1960’s and its problems, which set the ball rolling in Cerebral Palsy litigation in the USA. While explaining the duties owed by doctor to patient, the Unit also highlights the harm caused by rampant litigation both to the medical scenario as well to national health budgets. The Unit shows how the concept of Reactive, rather than Defensive, Medicine, can be seen as a potential silver lining in the “plague” of litigation. The Unit concludes by considering the future of litigation in the face of the leaps and bounds of science.

Learning Outcomes:

1. Knowledge & Understanding:

By the end of the Unit the student will be able to:

- Explain the inter-action between Medicine and Law, with particular reference to the expectations of society from Medicine and the legal remit when sub-standard practice or malpractice is present;
- Starting from the history of litigation and the safeguarding of society by regulating bodies of medical practice to current thoughts in medico-legal litigation, the student is enabled to demonstrate and discuss the interactions of society with law and medicine in a dynamic triangle of practical implications;
- Assess standards of medical practice, outline the meaning of medical negligence, liability, and the difference between the two;
- Explain the need and the right for legal redress;
- Discuss the multiplier effect of harm of rampant and unjustified litigation on the patients, doctors, insurance providers, national health budgets;
- Evaluate the reaction of medicine in the form of defensive (unhealthy) and “reactive” medicine (positive);
- Discuss the ever-evolving medico-legal principles, and the dynamics of the inter-relations of law and medicine.

2. Skills:

By the end of the Unit the student will be able to:

- Know the expectations and limitations medical practice as well the rights and duties of patients and doctors;
- Widen the horizon of expectations implied by medical care, including confidentiality, divulging of relevant information to the patient, the implications of consent;
- Outline the qualities of medico-legal jurisprudence, its dependence on the Court expert in medical matters and the responsibility of the final choice and decision;
- Prudence in accepting scientific facts and allowing time to be the great divulger of truth - as shown by the Cerebral Palsy story;
- Discuss the challenges which future medicine will face in respecting the law while being responsible to the patient and answerable at law. The challenges of counselling as in genetic counselling, the shift in ethnicity change and its potential medico- legal challenges;
- Evaluate the situations discussed both generally as well as with local eyes, purveying both the local situation as well as the European and American scene;
- Discuss the likely future of medico-legal litigation within the ever widening plethora of discoveries and their clinical applications. Appreciate the litigatory and ethical issues of the future as exemplified by e.g. genetic screening in antenatal care and its reflections on healer.

Main Text/s and any supplementary readings:

- BMA Medical Ethics Department (2013) Everyday Medical Ethics and Law. BMA Medical Ethics Department, London: BMJI Books / Wiley-Blackwell.
- Fremgan, B.F. (2015) Medical Law and Ethics, 5th Edition, Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press.
- Hondius, E., ed (2010)The Development of Medical Liability, vol. 3, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
- Sloan, F.A. and Chepke, L.M. (2010) Medical Malpractice, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
- Foster C, ed (2007) Medical Mistakes, Claerhout Publishing , 6 Woodstock Avenue, London W13 9UG, United Kingdom.
- Herring J., Medical Law and Ethics, 6th (2016)Edition, Oxford University Press.

Other material will also be provided by the lecturer, including details of the relevant Court cases referred to.

 
STUDY-UNIT TYPE Lecture

 
METHOD OF ASSESSMENT
Assessment Component/s Sept. Asst Session Weighting
Case Study (Exam Conditions) (2 Hours) Yes 100%

 
LECTURER/S

 

 
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The availability of optional units may be subject to timetabling constraints.
Units not attracting a sufficient number of registrations may be withdrawn without notice.
It should be noted that all the information in the description above applies to study-units available during the academic year 2023/4. It may be subject to change in subsequent years.

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