This I Believe…

1.) Patient autonomy should stop when….

Patient autonomy gives a patient control over what treatment they want, based on the
information they are given by their doctor. In medical practices, you could be the doctor and
faced with very difficult dissections like if you have a patient bleeding to death and need a
blood transfusion, but because of their religion they do not believe in having a blood
transfusion. Does the doctor grant the patient’s wishes or does the doctor save his life and
give the blood transfusion? What if the doctor does not know about the patient’s religious
beliefs and gives the blood transfusion in a life or death situation does the doctor have a leg
to stand on because he was only saving the patient’s life. I believe that people should have a
say in treatment but I think that in a life or death situation the doctor should be able to save
that life.
2.) Medical Research should…..
Medical research should continue to happen. We have gained so much from medical research
like vaccines, antibiotics and treatments for cancer. There are rules and laws when testing
different treatments on humans and animals, but this research has given humans life
expectancy to climb. People are living longer because of what scientists have found from
medical research. I think that medical research is so important to providing health care for
people and animals.
3.) Genetic testing for the future should..
Genetic testing for the future should be a really good thing for humans. Genetic testing can
identify changes in chromosomes, genes, or proteins and then can take those results to find
genetic conditions and disorders. As of now there are over a thousand genetic tests. Scientist
are still working on producing more testing which is going to open the door to treatment for
individuals. In the future, I think genetic testing will be the answer to treating patients
individually based on their DNA.
4.) Egg and sperm donation should be..
Egg and sperm donations should be researched more because I think this is a huge
advancement to health care science. People that want to birth children but cannot on their
own are given the opportunity to have children. I think it would be awesome if one day with
research and medical advancement they will be able to artificially birth children for women
that cannot birth children. Women that want children but cannot give birth and do not want
another woman to be a sergeant mother will have an alternate way of having children. If they
can take a women’s egg and the man’s sperm and fertilize the egg and somehow grow the
baby until it has fully developed and to be “birthed” would be a huge advancement.
5.) Abortion should/ should not be…
Abortion should be left up to the women. If she finds out that she is going to have medical
complications with the pregnancy to save her life or not to risk having an unhealthy baby.
She should have the choice for abortion. If the women were raped or just had unprotected sex
with someone she didn’t want to have a baby with she should have the choice of abortion and
not to go through with the pregnancy. I personally would have a very hard time going
through with an abortion but if the circumstance were right I would have no choice but to. If
you forbid abortion the mothers that feel stuck with their children are not going to have good
lives and could be mistreated. Ultimately it should be a freedom of choice whether the
women decide to go through a pregnancy or not.
6.) Treating or terminating impaired infants should be decided by…
Treating or deciding to terminate an impaired infant should be decided by the doctors and the
parents. Treatment should be done with the direction of a doctor. Termination should be left
up to the parents. They can take the doctors opinion on it but they need to decide if they want
to take care of an impaired child and the quality of life they want for the child. Termination
of a child’s life is a very hard decision to make but if the child is severely deformed or
severely sick the doctor can give the parents information and advice but it must be up to the
parents whether they decide to go through with the termination or not. I think most people
will take the advice from the doctor but based on religion or beliefs it would influence their
choice.
7.) Euthanasia and physician assisted suicide should be..
If a patient has reached a point in their health where they are no longer curable and the
quality of life they have is terrible they should have the choice. If they just to have assistance
in helping them die peacefully. People of a certain age like elderly people that have lived a
good life and they are just ready to go and feel it is their time should have an alternate way to
die. It gives them a quick and painless way of dying. I feel that people should be able to have
assistance in dying if that is what they want. The person administering the euthanasia has to
feel comfortable doing their job though because it could cause trauma to that person if they
feel it is not ethical.
8.) Payment to organ donors or their families should be..
I feel that payment should be voluntary and not required to donors. The donors have
voluntarily chosen to give up their organs to save another life so as gravitated or as a thank
you it could be given to the donor or the family. You cannot put a price tag on some one’s
life or what their life is worth. I feel once you start charging for organs people kill people for
their organs for money. People with a lot of money will be able to afford transplants and
organs but those that cannot will just have to die. I really do not think payment for organs
from another human being should be accepted. If it is a lab created organ I think that is
different. No one had to lose their life or lose an organ over it so there should be a fee or
charge for the work scientist and engineers have done.
9.) Allocation of health care should/ should not be considered based on a person’s age/
quality of life/ ability to pay..
I personally think that health care should be given to everyone no matter their age, quality of
life, or their ability to pay. Health insurance companies should not be able to make profits off
people’s wellbeing. Anyone that needs medical attention should be able to get it period.
There are so many people that need health care but cannot afford it and end up dying because
they cannot afford to be seen and treated by a doctor. Health care is so expensive and people
that do not have insurance and cannot afford treatment should not be turned away or treated
differently. It should be a universal system that will give everyone the help that they need
from health care.
10.) Medical research for women should..
Medical research for women needs to be done more. Women and men are very different
on a cellular level and for some reason most clinical research are done on men. There are
a lot of diseases that are more prone to women over men and there needs to be equal
research on men and women. The way both are treated can vary from gender. The way
women and men take treatment and get diseases are different to research needs to be done
equally so we can figure out how to treat men and women both.

11.) Health care for minorities should be..

Everyone should have access to health care and be treated for their conditions no matter
what race they are. We are all alive and are pretty much the same biologically. There
should not be any restrictions to health care based on your race. I know there are
minorities that are refused health care but that should never be the case. Everyone is
equal and should be treated that way no matter what ethnicity, race color or if you are
minority.

12.) Those with AIDS/HIV should..

Those people that are infected with AIDS or HIV should be able to live a normal life. They
should be careful though knowing that it can be spread from person to person. So, they need
to take precautions to help the disease from spreading to more people. They should be
cautious with sex, they need to tell their sexual partners about being infected or diagnosed
with AIDS or HIV before becoming sexually active and take every precaution to help it from
spreading. As of right now there is no cure for HIV or AIDS so it is a very serious disease
and needs to be handled correctly to help it from spreading.