Informed consent to medical intervention: the figure and role of a doctor

Abstract

Informed consent reflects a patient’s right to decide whether to receive or refuse medical intervention. Ideally, the patient receives all the necessary information from a physician and, consciously, allows the treatment or refuses it. However, in routine practice, a doctor may influence the patient’s decision: both because of professional knowledge, and because of the very fact that a patient seeks medical help. It follows from this that voluntary basis of a patient’s consent can hardly be absolute, since a doctor often influences his decision to a greater or lesser degree. The article proposes criteria for assessing the admissibility of doctor’s influence on a patient when deciding whether to sign informed consent to medical intervention or to refuse it, using the example of cardiac surgery.;