Ethical dimensions of the fetus as a patient

Abstract

In this chapter, we present an account of the ethical concept of the fetus as a patient to guide clinical judgment and decision-making in the obstetrician-patient relationship. We explicate this concept and explore its clinical implications on the basis of the professional responsibility model of obstetric ethics. We will emphasize a preventive ethics approach, which is based on the recognition of the potential for ethical conflict in patient care and adopts ethically justified strategies to prevent those conflicts from occurring. The goal of preventive ethics is to sustain a strong obstetrician-patient relationship. This goal is accomplished by balancing beneficence-based and autonomy-based ethical obligations to the pregnant patient with beneficence-based ethical obligations to the fetal patient in all cases in which the fetus is a patient.

Keywords: beneficence; fetus as a patient; preventive ethics respect for autonomy; professional responsibility model of obstetric ethics.