Consent for Non-Competent Parties

Consent for Incompetent Parties
Student’s Name
Department, University
Course Number: Course Name
Professor
Date
Consent for Incompetent Parties
One of the most challenging decisions facing medical practitioners is the determination of substitute decisions for incompetent patients. Part of the problem, in this case, is the lack of clear statutes to guide how such decisions should be made. The problem becomes more challenging considering that some substitute decisions might attract legal liability. Showalter addresses this issue extensively in his article “consent: in the law of health administration,” where he provides multiple cases that depict various gray areas when dealing with incompetent patients. One case includes a patient in a persistent vegetative state (PVS) whose parents being the legally mandated parties to make the substitute decision, opted for the patient to be allowed to die, considering that there were low chances for her to regain her health.
This case depicts a typical example where although the guardians, as the legally approved decision-...