Reflections on Teaching Law and Medicine

In responding to the question, What comes under the rubric of a law and medicine course? I intend to draw on my experiences- now twenty-nine years long-in the world of law and medicine. Some of my reflections, I hope, will prove instructive to you

Human Sacrifice and Human Experimentation: Reflections at Nuremberg

Hippocrates once said: Life is short, the Art long, opportunity fleeting, experiment treacherous, judgment difficult. On this fiftieth anniversary of the Doctors\u27 Trial, which charged Nazi physicians with crimes against humanity and violations of Hippocratic ethics in the conduct of human experimentation, I want to begin with Hippocrates\u27 observation that to experiment [is] treacherous

Informed Consent – Must It Remain a Fairy Tale?

When the editors of the Journal of Contemporary Health Law and Policy asked me to contribute an article to their issue in honor of my friend, colleague and dean, Guido Calabresi, I accepted their invitation with pleasure. Since I had reflected about informed consent for two decades, I welcomed this opportunity to set forth my final thoughts and conclusions, however briefly and summarily, on this doctrine and its impact on physician- patient decisionmaking. This essay gives a good account of what I shall ever be able to say about informed consent

Dangerousness and Mental Illness: Some Observations on the Decision to Release Persons Acquitted by Reason of Insanity

On July 10, 1958, following the trial of Edith L. Hough for murder in the District of Columbia she was found not guilty by reason of insanity. Consequently she was committed to Saint Elizabeth\u27s Hospital for treatment and custody. On October 20, 1958, approximately three months later, Dr. Winfred Overholser, the hospital\u27s superintendent, notified the trial court that Miss Hough has now recovered sufficiently to be granted her conditional release . . . . In response to an objection by the United States Attorney, a hearing was held before a trial judge who, after listening to the testimony of several psychiatrists, denied the release and directed the superintendent to discontinue his practice of allowing Miss Hough to leave the hospital for short periods during the day, except when in the custody of a hospital attendant. The judge found that she had not recovered her sanity and that it had not been established that she will not in the reasonable future be dangerous to herself or others. In reaching his decision, he found that the psychiatric testimony demonstrated that Miss Hough was still suffering from a schizophrenic reaction of the paranoid type and that she lacked any insight concerning the seriousness of the killing. He also took into account the shortness of the lapse of time since trial because he felt early release would be in conflict with the function of detention as a means of imposing punishment

The State of Sustainable Research Software: Results from the Workshop on Sustainable Software for Science: Practice and Experiences (WSSSPE5.1)

This article summarizes motivations, organization, and activities of the Workshop on Sustainable Software for Science: Practice and Experiences (WSSSPE5.1) held in Manchester, UK in September 2017. The WSSSPE series promotes sustainable research software by positively impacting principles and best practices, careers, learning, and credit. This article discusses the Code of Conduct, idea papers, position papers, experience papers, demos, and lightning talks presented during the workshop. The main part of the article discusses the speed-blogging groups that formed during the meeting, along with the outputs of those sessions

Efficacy, safety and tolerability of combination therapy with timolol and dorzolamide in glaucoma and ocular hypertension

Combination pharmacotherapy has simplified and improved glaucoma medication regimens. This update focuses on the previous and recent studies on efficacy and tolerability profile of dorzolamide–timolol in adult ocular hypertension and open angle glaucoma patients. Dorzolamide–timolol has been shown to be efficacious and well tolerated in clinical trials and the adverse effects reflect those of the individual components