Tag Archives: ethics
Podcast on KevinMD: What doctors need to know about state Physician Health Programs given their power and potential dangers, along with an inability to appeal their demands and recommendations
Physician health programs (PHPs) have way more power than most MDs know and physicians who are referred to PHPs usually have to do anything and everything PHPs tell them if they want to continue to practice medicine. MDs who object … Continue reading
The Potential Dangers of Testing Your Own DNA
I was lucky to meet Dani Shapiro through HMS Bioethics when she came to speak in a class I taught there about her book Inheritance. That meeting ultimately resulted in Josh North, Rennie Burke, Yvette Ollada, Gali Katznelson and I … Continue reading
How broad are state physician health program descriptions of physician impairment?
My latest piece with co-author and Georgetown law student Nick Lawson is here. All credit for this piece is due to Nick who conceived of the idea and ran with it. Physician health programs (PHPs) are unknown to most physicians … Continue reading
Don’t Trust Data and Statistics about PHP Success Rates
Nicholas Lawson, fellow physician and incoming Georgetown Law student, and I penned this letter in General Hospital Psychiatry Lawson Boyd Letter Gen Hosp Psych on PHPs which makes clear the myriad reasons why the success and satisfaction rates that Physician Health … Continue reading
New York Times letter about Jeff Sessions and Asylum–What Sessions Did 2 Days Ago is Beyond Abhorent
Here it is: To the Editor: Re “Sessions Shrinks Paths to Asylum” (front page, June 12): The ruling that Attorney General Jeff Sessions handed down saying that fleeing domestic or gang violence isn’t reason enough to qualify someone to receive … Continue reading
Behind Bars: Ethics and Human Rights in U.S. Prisons
Behind Bars: Ethics and Human Rights in U.S. Prisons November 30 – December 1, 2017 Harvard Medical School Campus, Boston, MA View Schedule The United States leads the world in incarceration. The “War on Drugs” and prioritizing punishment over rehabilitation … Continue reading
Psychologists and Torture
A day after I wrote this piece for theconversation.com about psychologists and torture, the New York Times highlighted a newly issued report that details the extent to which senior level members of the American Psychological Association (APA) conspired with the … Continue reading
New Movie about Doctors’ Participation in Torture in the “War on Terror”
The movie is called Doctors of the Dark Side. You can see a trailer for the movie here. The website also has a study guide which provides invaluable information as well as resources for further information on this whole topic.
A Painfully Long Wait–Boston Globe editorial May 6, 2013
The Boston Globe published an editorial today reporting our work and amplifying our call for better treatment of psychiatric patients. The fact that insurers require prior authorization for (so many) psychiatric services but not for other medical services illustrates the extent … Continue reading
What Exactly Went into My Psychiatric Diagnosis?–Psychology Today blog post
The folks who are rewriting the diagnostic manual in psychiatry have often built their careers on the diagnosis in question and/or have received money from Big Pharma, so that the diagnoses they craft are potentially fraught with conflicts of interest … Continue reading