Essay Example on Mother's Right to Refuse Unwanted Healthcare Treatment

Scenario 1

In this scenario, the legal rights of the mother as the patient should be upheld. In many instances, the patients have always been given the right to decide for themselves. The supreme court of the United States has reaffirmed that every person is deemed to protected liberty of interest by the constitution to refuse any form of unwanted healthcare treatment (Daboval, 2015). This is beyond any debate since it is the patient's co-principal autonomy as the medical ethics principle.

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Where a pregnant woman refuses any beneficial fetal treatment, the principle has always been legally set aside. In the case of Angela Carder, the hospital's liability fears were a reason for their insistence on the medical care which had been ordered by the court (Daboval, 2015). It is important to note that Angela Carder was the one pregnant and hence she landed her body to bring the fetus into the world. In this case, there she is entitled to her duty of assuring the fetus' welfare was sufficient even in demanding her to undergo the Caesarean process of delivery.

From this case, Angel Carder is unable to give informed consent, unlike other patients, and she had the right to having her decision ascertained in strict conformance to the procedure referred to as substituted judgment. It is not ethical to compel a woman to undergo surgery just because she is the one who chose to become pregnant and also the fetus has no rights in this respect which can be depicted as superior to the ones who have already been born (Daboval, 2015). The act of tolerating the issue of invasive medical treatment to Angela Carder would vest on the fetus with the rights which are superior to her whose medical choice was subordinated. Despite that she was deemed lay near the door of death, Angela was deemed to carry along with her fetus. Therefore, from this argument, based on the jury's judgment, the mother's rights had to be upheld.

Scenario 2 - Elective Cesarean upon Maternal Request

Stephanie is not entitled to the right to the elective cesarean section. Regardless of the fact that her second labor and also delivery was faced with many challenges to her and the baby. Besides, the born child could have been due to other fetal deformities apart from a vaginal delivery. In the case of the elective cesarean section, it is normally associated with the risk of the complications of the neonatal respiratory with the inclusion of the tachypnea of the newborn, which thus increases the ventilator support, oxygen therapy and also admission (Chigbu, 2010). Stephanie will, therefore, be risking the incidence of distress due to the respiration and which is usually much higher than in the case of vaginal delivery.

Also, Stephanie at the time she chose the elective cesarean section, was 36 weeks pregnant. Stephanie should have understood that the complications were higher if the CS was performed since the baby was below 39 weeks of gestation. All babies born before this time of pregnancy have about the three-to fourfold high risk of breathing trouble as compared to those whose mothers have had normal cases of delivery i.e. the vaginal delivery (Chigbu, 2010). Thus granting her the right to Caesarean section delivery is more likely to compromise the life and health of the unborn. Furthermore, the expected date of delivery of the baby was uncertain and hence it was possible that it would have inadvertently be performed prematurely leading to a further increase in the case of the complications in the neonatal respiratory. In this case, the health official had all the reasons for declining Stephanie's right since her risks outweighed the potential benefit.

Scenario 3 - Borderline Viability, to Resuscitate or Not

There is a need to resuscitate the baby at delivery as demanded by the parents Margo Greenburg and her husband. In most cases, many guidelines and publications give specific advice on the scenarios when the discretion of the parents on resuscitation is appropriate. In this case, the gestation age of the infant is always a determinant on whether the stated resuscitation can be found within the grey zone (Leuthner, 2014). In the case of Margo, she was 22+5 weeks pregnant which was clear from this that her infant's gestation age was within the grey zone. From the law, it is only during this period when the discretion of the parents is allowed on the baby's resuscitation.

Therefore the neonatal department had to treat the baby at birth since the parents were much willing to take everything in a bid to save their baby at delivery. The ethics committee will have no otherwise but to let the parents will prevail. The focus on the gestation age of the infant neglects the possible uncertainty existing about the infant's stated gestation. Besides, other factors ought to be taken into account by the ethics committee before upholding any of the rights, whether to resuscitate or nor (Leuthner, 2014). These factors mainly have an influence on the prognosis for the extreme cases of preterm infants like in the case of Margo's baby which includes sex, birth weight, and the use of the corticosteroids of the antenatal and also whether the fetus is multiple or singleton. In building the consensus between the parents and the neonatal department, the ethics committee can also use the framework based on prognosis to examine and debate on the baby's resuscitation critically. Thus in this regard, the resuscitation of the infant, if it is within the grey zone of the gestation age, is dependent on the parents' decision and hence the neonatal department will have to uphold the parents' demands.

Scenario 4 - Genetic Engineering and Designer Babies

The jury should decide that Melissa and Jake experiment with genetic engineering as well as the trait selection. It is essential to understand that it is only the genes which influence the health and diseases besides human traits and behavior. The genetic technology has been used in unraveling the contributions of genomic to the different phenotypes and in addition coming up with various other potential applications for the technology (Pray, 2008). The advances in technology have given a chance for direct examination of certain differences among the sizable numbers of people. Hence, there is no much problem with selecting their child experimenting with the trait. For grown-up beginning conditions, moral concerns have been raised in regards to whether hereditary testing ought to be performed if there is no solution for the sickness being referred to (Pray, 2008). Numerous individuals wonder whether a positive finding of a looming untreatable ailment will hurt the in danger individual by making undue pressure and uneasiness.

References

Daboval, T., Ferretti, E., Rohde, K., Muirhead, P., & Moore, G. (2015). Neonatal Ethics Teaching Program-Scenario Oriented Learning in Ethics: Antenatal Consultation at the Limit of Viability.

Chigbu, C. O., Ezenyeaku, C. C., & Ezenkwele, E. P. (2010). Obstetricians' attitudes to caesarean delivery on maternal request. Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, 30(8), 813-817.

Leuthner, S. R. (2014). Borderline viability: controversies in caring for the extremely premature infant. Clinics in perinatology, 41(4), 799-814.

Pray, L. (2008). Embryo screening and the ethics of human genetic engineering. Nature Education, 1(1), 207.