Preoperative Preparation of the Patient

Abstract

There are several reasons for counselling a patient about her treatment. Firstly, it is her right to make a reasoned choice and she will need information to do this. Secondly, counselling will allay her anxiety about the procedure. Thirdly, the patient should sign a consent form, which gives express rather than implied consent. To do this, she will need to know the nature of her medical condition, the choice of treatment, the need for surgery, the prognosis or success rate and equally important—the chance, nature and extent of complications.

The true position is that an error of judgement may or may not be negligent; it depends on the nature of the error. If it is one that would not have been made by a reasonably competent professional man professing to have the standards and type of skill that the defendant holds himself out as having and acting with ordinary care then it is negligent. If on the other hand it is an error that such a man acting with ordinary care might have made then it is not negligent.

Lord Fraser House of Lords