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Preventing Tragedy: Balancing Physicians' Ethical Obligations to Patients and the Public

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 April 2013

Emily E. Anderson ,
Lee J. Black  and
Nathan A. Bostick
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Abstract

The recent shootings at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech) suggest that an increased reliance upon the medical community to support public health violence prevention efforts may be warranted. As physicians are called upon to support these efforts, they must effectively balance their obligations to promote public safety with their traditional obligations to promote the best interests of their individual patients. To meet these concurrent ethical obligations, physicians' participation in public health violence prevention should seek to improve public safety without compromising the care of patients or exposing individuals to undue harm. Physicians should, therefore, report to the appropriate authorities those patients who are at risk of committing violent acts toward the public, but should only disclose the minimal amount of information that is necessary to protect the public. Moreover, physicians should also recommend the separation of violent individuals from the community at large when necessary to improve public safety while advocating for the provision of appropriate treatment measures to improve the patients' well-being. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2007;1(Suppl 1):S38–S42)

Keywords

physicians' ethical obligationspatient confidentialitypublic health violence preventionindividual rights
Type
Special Focus
Information
Disaster Medicine and Public Health Preparedness , Volume 1 , Issue S1 , September 2007 , pp. S38 - S42
Copyright
Copyright © Society for Disaster Medicine and Public Health, Inc. 2007

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