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Ethical Issues in Older Adults

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Principles and Practice of Geriatric Surgery

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Abstract

Normative ethics addresses the criteria or standards by which we judge whether an action is considered to be right or wrong. Medical ethics is built on a utilitarian ethical structure; it bases what we ought to do on competing principles that are applied in the context of the clinical setting and not on overarching deontological moral imperatives. The guiding principles of American medical ethics are those of respect for autonomy, nonmaleficence, beneficence, and justice (Table 1).

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Medicine (Geriatrics), Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT, USA

    Margaret Drickamer

Authors
  1. Margaret Drickamer
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Margaret Drickamer .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. VA Connecticut Health Care System, Yale University School of Medicine, West Haven, CT, USA

    Ronnie A. Rosenthal

  2. Weill Cornell Medicine, Department of Surgery, New York Presbyterian Brooklyn Methodist Hospital, Brooklyn, NY, USA

    Michael E. Zenilman

  3. Department of Surgery, Sinai Center for Geriatric Surgery, Sinai Hospital, Baltimore, MD, USA

    Mark R. Katlic

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Drickamer, M. (2020). Ethical Issues in Older Adults. In: Rosenthal, R., Zenilman, M., Katlic, M. (eds) Principles and Practice of Geriatric Surgery. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47771-8_19

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47771-8_19

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-47770-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-47771-8

  • eBook Packages: MedicineReference Module Medicine

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