Tag: medical imaging technology

Article from Dr. Stahl in ‘AJOB Neuroscience’

Devan Stahl photoCenter Assistant Professor Dr. Devan Stahl and co-author John Banja (Emory University) have a target article in the current issue of AJOB Neuroscience, titled “The Persisting Problem of Precedent Autonomy Among Persons in a Minimally Conscious State: The Limitations of Philosophical Analysis and Clinical Assessment.”

Abstract: Determining whether it is ethical to withdraw life-sustaining treatments (WOLST) from a patient in the minimally conscious state (MCS) recalls recurring debates in bioethics, including the applicability of precedent autonomy and the usefulness of quality-of-life assessments. This article reviews the new clinical understanding of MCS and the complexities involved in detecting covert awareness in patients. Given the diagnostic and prognostic uncertainty surrounding most MCS determinations, we review the ongoing debates concerning precedent autonomy as they apply to making WOLST determinations for patients in MCS. We also consider the moral obligations clinicians might have to understand an MCS patient’s advance directives, current preferences, and quality of life. We argue that an optimal approach for making WOLST determinations requires weighing patients’ previous wishes against their current circumstances but that even here, factual as well as ethical vagaries and disagreements will be relatively commonplace.

The full text is available online via Taylor & Francis Online (MSU Library or other institutional access may be required to view these articles).

Episode 7: ‘Imaging and Imagining Illness’ with Devan and Darian Stahl

No Easy Answers in Bioethics logoEpisode 7 of No Easy Answers in Bioethics is now available! This episode features guests Devan Stahl, Assistant Professor in the Center for Ethics and Humanities in the Life Sciences and the Department of Pediatrics and Human Development, and Darian Goldin Stahl, artist and printmaker. This episode delves into the intersection of fine art, illness, disability, and self-identity. The recently released book Imaging and Imagining Illness: Becoming Whole in a Broken Body began as a collaboration between sisters Devan and Darian, one with personal origins. The edited volume examines the impact of medical imaging technologies on patients and our wider culture. In this episode, they discuss Darian’s artistic process, how audiences have reacted to the artwork, and how they came to invite other scholars to build on their work.

Ways to Listen

This episode was produced and edited by Liz McDaniel in the Center for Ethics. Music: “While We Walk (2004)” by Antony Raijekov via Free Music Archive, licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike License. Full transcript available.

About: No Easy Answers in Bioethics is a podcast series from the Center for Ethics and Humanities in the Life Sciences in the Michigan State University College of Human Medicine. Each month Center for Ethics faculty and their collaborators discuss their ongoing work and research across many areas of bioethics—clinical ethics, evidence-based medicine, health policy, medical education, neuroethics, shared decision-making, and more. Episodes are hosted by H-Net: Humanities and Social Sciences Online.