Medico-Legal Articles

Patient Education & Informed Consent
What is Informed Consent?Informed consent is the process by which an informed patient gives permission to a doctor or healthcare provider to perform a specific medical treatment or procedure. It is based on the principle that patients have the right...
The Merits of Patient Education in an Age of Complaints
While discussions with patients about the benefits, risks and range of treatments have become imperative due to many changes in healthcare consumerism and patients’ expectations, the principal driver of change has been the Australian High Court case of Rogers v...
Complaints To Regulators Drive Surgeons’ Medico-Legal Matters
"Complaints To Regulators Drive Surgeons’ Medico-Legal Matters" (Avant Media, 23 January 2017) discusses the increasing prevalence of patient complaints stemming from a lack of lack of doctor-patient communication and highlights the usefulness of patient handouts to improve patient outcomes and minimise the risk...
Informed Consent And Communicating Information
The article "Informed Consent And Communicating Information" guides doctors through the key elements of informed consent. The article states "Ensuring that patients are provided with sufficient information to give informed consent may seem complex and does cause concern for practitioners. It may...
The Cases of Rogers v. Whitaker and Chappel v. Hart
“A doctor has a duty to warn a patient of a material risk inherent in a proposed treatment; a risk is material if, in the circumstances of the particular case, a reasonable person in the patient's position, if warned of the risk...