LAW7133

Legal issues in medicine

(LAW)

Professor P L Waller

6 points + One 3-hour session per week (and 2 or 3 day visits program in the mid-semester break) + Second semester + Clayton + Prerequisites: Medical students: third year of the MBBS

Synopsis: Practising law and practising medicine. Principles governing clinical medical practice. The foundation of medical ethics. The relationship between medicine and allied health professions. The regulation of the medical profession. Doctors, patients and the law and alternatives to litigation. Medical negligence and consent. Rights to refuse medical treatment, and competence and incompetence in law and medicine. Medical confidentiality. Law and psychiatry. The body as property. Medical research: volunteers, institutional ethics committees and the law. Medical treatment and the end of life. The beginnings of life: novel birth technologies and abortion. Doctors in court.

Assessment: Two class tests: 40% + Research paper (3000-4000 words): 60%