Letters
Ethics
Volume 196 - Issue 1

Should doctors feel able to practise according to their personal values and beliefs?

Author:  Peter C Arnold

Med J Aust 2012; 196 (1): 38. || doi: 10.5694/mja11.11449
Published online: 16 January 2012
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To the Editor: Were the views expressed by Conway and Savulescu really opposing?1,2 I turned to those pages with much interest, only to find that it seemed as if they would have been in agreement, had you put the scenarios they each describe to both of them.

Conway discussed the conflict between doctor and patient about acceptability of the recommended management (the “best interests” of a dying child). In contrast, Savulescu talked of irrational prejudices held by doctors on the grounds of race, sex and other factors. Indeed, unless I missed some subtle points, I could not see any opposition in their arguments.

I was, therefore, stumped when your online poll asked me to vote on the question: “Do doctors have the right to refuse certain treatments on the grounds of personal conscience?” Is the question asking about Conway’s point about what the doctor sincerely, on medical grounds, considers to be in the patient’s best interests, or is the question asking about a doctor’s refusal to attend to a patient on the basis of some irrational prejudice?

Horses of quite different colours — racing in different races.

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