Medico-legal aspects of surgical practice

2018 ◽  
pp. 27-40
Author(s):  
Abdullah Jibawi ◽  
Mohamed Baguneid ◽  
Arnab Bhowmick
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Brain Stem ◽  
Healthcare Professionals ◽  
Burden Of Proof ◽  
Legal Aspects ◽  
Reasonable Doubt ◽  
Medical Law ◽  
Criminal Cases ◽  
High Court ◽  
Surgical Practice

Medical law is a branch of law concerned with the responsibilities of healthcare professionals and the rights of patients. Civil cases (litigation) are heard in the County and High Court in England and Wales, and Sheriff Courts and Court of Session in Scotland. If a trial takes place, then the claimant has to provide enough evidence, and judgment would be based on the balance of probabilities. Both parties can appeal the judgment. Criminal cases (proceedings) are dealt with by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) in most cases. The CPS engages barristers to conduct the prosecution in the higher court. The burden of proof is placed on the prosecution. They must call supporting evidences to prove that the defendant is guilty. The defendant then needs to prove that the evidence is unreliable and that the evidence does not prove guilt to the required standards. i.e. beyond reasonable doubt. Doctors should always be aware of certain aspects of medicolegal principles in their practice, such as rules for appearing in court for doctors, writing a statement, mental health act, brain stem death, and confidentiality.

Proof of Causation in Tort Cases

2020 ◽  
Vol 82 ◽  
pp. 149-160
Author(s):  
Bohdan Karnaukh
Keyword(s):  
Common Law ◽  
Civil Law ◽  
Burden Of Proof ◽  
Reasonable Doubt ◽  
Criminal Cases ◽  
Ways Of Coping ◽  
Law System ◽  
Standard Of Proof ◽  
Civil Cases ◽  
Civil Law System

The article addresses the problem of uncertainty over causation in tort cases. It reveals the interconnection between burden of proof and standard of proof. The author provides a comparative overview of approaches to standard of proof in common law and civil law systems. It is argued that while in common law there are two different standards viz: beyond-reasonable-doubt-standard for criminal cases and balanceof-probabilities standard for civil cases in civil law system there is only one standard applicable both to criminal and civil cases. With comparative analysis in the background the article also reveals the peculiarities of Ukrainian law in the respect of the issue raised. The problem is approached in a pragmatic manner: using a hypothetical case the author models practical outcomes entailed by each of the approaches being applied to the case. Eventually the conclusion is made that there are four ways of coping with uncertainty over causation: (1) to reverse the burden of proof; (2) to calibrate the standard of proof for certain cases; (3) to recognize the very creation of the abnormal risk as a compensable damage; and (4) to multiply damage plaintiff sustained by the probability factor indicating the likelihood of the damage being actually caused by the defendant.

scholarly journals Beyond Reasonable Doubt: An Abductive Dilemma in Criminal Law

2008 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 60 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Woods
Keyword(s):  
Common Law ◽  
Burden Of Proof ◽  
Total Evidence ◽  
Reasonable Doubt ◽  
Technical Solution ◽  
Criminal Proceedings ◽  
Criminal Cases ◽  
Criminal Convictions ◽  
The Face ◽  
The Cost

In criminal cases at common law, juries are permitted to convict on wholly circumstantial evidence even in the face of a reasonable case for acquittal. This generates the highly counterintuitive—if not absurd—consequence that there being reason to think that the accused didn’t do it is not reason to doubt that he did. This is the no-reason-to-doubt problem. It has a technical solution provided that the evidence on which it is reasonable to think that the accused didn’t do it is a different subset of the total evidence from that on which there is no reason to doubt that he did do it. It lies in the adversarial nature of criminal proceedings in the common law tradition that the subsets of the total evidence on which counsel base their opposing arguments are themselves different from and often incompatible with one another. While this solves the no-reason-to-doubt problem, it does so at the cost of triggering a second problem just as bad. It is the no-rival problem, according to which incompatible theories of the case based on incompatible subsets of the evidence cannot be rivals of one another. If neither party’s case contradicts the other’s then, by the burden of proof requirement, criminal convictions are impossible. Once having generated the dilemma, the object of the paper is to determine how it might be escaped.

scholarly journals On understanding of proof in English and American law

2018 ◽  
Vol 81 (2) ◽  
pp. 13-27
Author(s):  
O. V. Tiaglo
Keyword(s):  
Burden Of Proof ◽  
Convincing Evidence ◽  
Three Dimensions ◽  
Reasonable Doubt ◽  
Criminal Cases ◽  
Standard Of Proof ◽  
Logical Connection ◽  
American Law ◽  
History Of ◽  
Legal Proof

This research paper is devoted to explication of understanding of proof in English and American law by means of study of its evolution and current condition. To get this aim the comparative analysis of few similar fragments from the Black’s law dictionary is completed. It is concluded, firstly, that concept of judicial proof grasps both process of presentation of legal evidence and its effects – conclusion, supported by system of the evidence, and belief to this conclusion, induced in minds of relevant persons. Secondly, cluster of (concepts and relevant) terms, by which proof in English and American law is (realized and) expressed, includes, among others, «truth», «proof» and «evidence», «to prove» and «to evidence», «burden of proof», «degree of proof», «standard of proof», «standard of proof beyond reasonable doubt», «standard of proof by preponderance of the evidence», «standard of proof by clear and convincing evidence», «legality», «admissibility», as well as «belief», «conviction», «to convince» and «to persuade». Thirdly, this cluster had been shaped and develops further – in addition to natural space and time – in at least three dimensions: logical, legal, and rhetorical. If during the late XIX – the first half of the XX century in this cluster were prevailing that was laying in logical and legal dimensions, then since the middle of XX century there is an expansion of rhetorical content through, at least partially, extrusion of the logical. Fourthly, on this way the concept of judicial proof has lost – as necessary components of its content – immanent signs of the logical proof, namely, truth of the premises-evidence and necessary logical connection between system of the evidence and conclusion. Concept of standard of proof has undergone significant change: it is divided into three subordinate concepts, usage of which depends on situation. And even those of these subordinate concepts, which correspond to criminal cases and include the strongest requirements, do not require truth or absolute certainty of the conclusion, agreeing only on absence of reasonable doubt that by nature is subjective and practically never avoid some dependence on rhetorical influence. Finally, the history of understanding and expression of legal proof shows that real legal proof goes more and more away from its analog in logic.

Moral Certitude: Merits and Demerits of the Standard of Proof Applied in Roman Catholic Jurisprudence

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 300-325
Author(s):  
Judith Hahn
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Church ◽  
Canon Law ◽  
Burden Of Proof ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Convincing Evidence ◽  
Reasonable Doubt ◽  
Criminal Cases ◽  
Standard Of Proof ◽  
Standards Of Proof ◽  
Anglo American

Abstract In Roman Catholic canon law, moral certitude describes the ecclesiastical judge’s full conviction that a defendant is guilty or that a statement of claim made by a civil plaintiff is rightful. Moral certitude is the requirement for a conviction or a civil sentence in favour of the party under the burden of proof. Secular legal orders apply other standards. Anglo-American legal cultures mostly refer to the beyond a reasonable doubt standard in criminal cases, the preponderance of evidence, or the clear and convincing evidence standard in civil matters. Continental European cultures predominantly refer to the standard of full conviction in criminal and civil matters alike. This article compares those standards of proof with moral certitude in order to better understand its merits and limits. Based on this comparison, it examines the arguments both in favour of and against abiding with moral certitude as a standard of proof in the Catholic Church.

Reproductive rights: Legal aspects of the right to sterilisation

Stanovnistvo ◽  
2001 ◽  
Vol 39 (1-4) ◽  
pp. 119-130 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hajrija Mujovic-Zornic
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Free Choice ◽  
Reproductive Rights ◽  
German Law ◽  
Legal Aspects ◽  
Penal Policy ◽  
Abortion Law ◽  
Legal Questions ◽  
The Right ◽  
Voluntary Sterilization

In this paper the author discusses the nature and importance of the right to reproduce, in particular the right to sterilisation. In the time past sterilization has been practiced only as a measure of penal policy or the prevention of mental health diseases. Today, mostly we can speak about the right to sterilization (especially reversible sterilization). The patient have a free choice to decide any method of contraception and that could be a voluntary sterilization (also called human, contraceptive, non-therapeutical in French law, and obliging in German law). Various legal questions about this right can be raised, in accordance of state of reproductive rights (how they are regulated by the law) and the protection of reproductive rights (especially the right of pregnant woman as a patient). Yugoslav law not yet has a complete regulation and adequate solutions in this area, except the abortion law. The primary gynecology care has contraceptive counseling, but concrete measures and education are insufficient. It cannot begin to give consistent answers to all of these questions without a coherent conception of the right to reproduce, which is the primary duty of legal experts.

Crime-Preventing Neurointerventions and the Law

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisa Forsberg
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Sex Offenders ◽  
Ethical Issues ◽  
Medical Law ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
Mental Health Legislation ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Legal Regimes ◽  
Health Legislation

Anti-libidinal interventions (ALIs) are a type of crime-preventing neurointervention (CPN) already in use in many jurisdictions. This chapter examines different types of legal regimes under which ALIs might be provided to sex offenders. The types of legal regimes examined are dedicated statutes that directly provide for ALI use, consensual ALI provision under general medical law principles, mental health legislation providing for ALI use (exemplified by the mental health regime in England and Wales), and European human rights law as it pertains to ALI provision. The chapter considers what we might learn from ALIs in respect of likely or possible arrangements for the provision of other CPNs, and draws attention to some ethical issues raised by each of these types of regime, worth keeping in mind when considering arrangements for CPN provision.

Depressions Plural

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
K W M (Bill) Fulford ◽  
David Crepaz-Keay ◽  
Giovanni Stanghellini
Keyword(s):  
Quality Of Life ◽  
Mental Health ◽  
Health Care ◽  
Mental Health Care ◽  
Personal Values ◽  
The Political ◽  
Medical Law ◽  
Isaiah Berlin ◽  
Political Philosopher

This chapter examines how values influence the heterogeneity of depression. The plurality of values is increasingly significant for contemporary person-centred mental health care with its emphasis on quality of life and development of self-manvnagement skills. Values-based practice is a partner with medical law invn working with the plurality of personal values. The chapter explains what values are, shows how the plurality of values influences the heterogeneity of depression at several levels, and provides an overview of values-based practice. It looks at the resources available for combining values-based practice with medical law in contemporary person-centred care and indicates some of the challenges this raises. It concludes with a brief reflection on these challenges understood as an instance of what the political philosopher Isaiah Berlin called the challenge of pluralism.

scholarly journals A novel patient-reported outcome monitoring with clinical feedback system in bariatric surgery care: study protocol, design and plan for evaluation

BMJ Open ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (6) ◽  
pp. e037685
Author(s):  
Pål André Hegland ◽  
Anny Aasprang ◽  
Ronette L Kolotkin ◽  
Christian Moltu ◽  
Grethe S Tell ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Bariatric Surgery ◽  
Data Protection ◽  
Healthcare Professionals ◽  
Feedback System ◽  
Patient Reported Outcome ◽  
Outpatient Clinics ◽  
Outcome Monitoring ◽  
Patient Reported ◽  
Clinical Feedback

BackgroundConsultations before and after bariatric surgery should include structured assessments of patients’ health-related quality of life (HRQOL) and mental health. One way to conduct this assessment is to implement patient-reported outcome monitoring with a clinical feedback system (PRO/CFS).AimWe will explore patients’ and healthcare professionals’ experiences when a PRO/CFS is an integrated part of bariatric surgery care.Methods and analysesThis is a design paper in which a PRO/CFS will be implemented in two bariatric outpatient clinics. All patients who have an appointment with a healthcare professional prior to, and 3 and 12 months after surgery, will be asked to complete six digital questionnaires measuring HRQOL, mental health, bowel symptoms and eating self-efficacy prior to each consultation. A digital summary report generated from the patient’s responses will form the basis for the clinical consultation. A team of patient representatives, healthcare professionals and researchers will be involved in all phases of designing the PRO/CFS to ensure its relevance for clinical consultations. The patients’ experiences will be explored with a generic 12-item questionnaire, developed for use in outpatient clinics, prior to and 12 months after bariatric surgery. We will conduct focus-group interviews with patients and healthcare professionals to explore their experiences when PRO/CFS is integrated into the consultations.Ethics and disseminationWritten informed consent will be obtained for all participants in the study. The project is approved by the Norwegian Centre for Research Data, Department of Data Protection Services (ref. no. 282738). The project has also undergone Data Protection Impact Assessments, both at Førde Hospital Trust and at St. Olav Hospital (registration no. 2016/3912). Data from the qualitative and quantitative studies will be kept in de-identified form in a secured research database, and the findings will be published in international peer-reviewed journals and presented at scientific conferences.

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