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Law and Ethics in Health Care

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Submitted By jiju68
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Law and Ethics in Health Care Laws and ethical principles are essential for protecting the mankind, and they play a crucial role in the practice of health care. Laws and ethics play a vital role in cases such as organ donation, human genetics, and HIV/AIDS and confidentiality. The health care issue I selected for discussion is HIV/AIDS. In the case of HIV/AIDS patients, there is always ethical conflict of protecting the confidentiality of patient and disclosing the information to others about the risks of the disease.
Salient Ethical and Legal Concerns Associated with HIV/AIDS As described by Pozgar (2013) one of the legal issues is the association between blood transfusion and HIV. Law suits often arise when a person with AIDA claims that he or she contracted the disease due to the administration of contaminated blood (Pozgar, 2013). Lawsuits commonly arise when there is transfusion of mismatched blood, improper screening, and improper storage procedures (Pozgar, 2013). Since May 1985, all blood donated in the United States are screened for HIV antibodies and even then patient’s may claim that they contracted the disease due to transfusion. Another legal and ethical issue is whether to allow the AIDS infected surgeons to perform surgeries. Pozgar (2013) described that the transmission of the virus from an infected surgeon to a patient is unlikely, but there is still a possibility. There is an ethical dilemma whether to allow these surgeons to perform surgeries or not. Because of the consequences of transmission, infected physician should not do invasive procedures (Pozgar, 2013). Confidentiality is another important ethical issue related to HIV. As per Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and Prevention guidelines, the healthcare workers who are exposed to susceptible procedures has to undergo tests to determine the infection status (Pozgar,

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