Bioethics Health and Treatment

Question: Discuss about the Bioethics for Health and Treatment. Answer: This assignment has focused on the ethical issues regarding Bills health and treatment. Bill is a fifty years old man, who has undergone unhealthy lifestyle for the last thirty years with a very poor quality diet, lack of physical exercise and alcohol abuse. Upon his visit to the physician, he became aware of the fact that he is suffering from diabetes and his kidney condition is not well, it has began to fail and within the next two years, his kidney will entirely lose its function. Bill has also been informed that if he undergoes kidney transplantation, his life expectancy will be around 5 years with ongoing dialysis and his doctor has informed that his nature of kidney failure will need kidney transplantation and after a successful transplant, he will have 10 years of life expectancy. Moreover, he will need to take immunosuppressant after the surgery. In legal process, it will require around 8 years to find a suitable donor, as the waiting list for donated kidney is long. Thus, Bi ll has a second thought to avoid the waiting list and he found a clinic, where he can get a donor within 12 months, but his physician addressed that the procedure will be illegal. Now, Bill is undergoing the ethical dilemma that whether he should save his life by undergoing the illegal procedure or should wait according to the legal procedure for a donated kidney and thereby reducing his chance of survival. Ethical and legal debate over paying live organ donors has emerged as long as the transplantation procedure has existed. The presence of NOTA in US and similar legislations in the other developed countries is not fully able to prevent the development of a triving black market for live organ donation. However, from a moral and humanistic perspective, Bill can use the donor from the clinic, as the life of a human being is the most important thing. If a patient, who has a maximum life expectancy of 5 years, has to wait for 8 years to get a transplanted organ, it is the fault of the existing health care system, because, in medical care, life-related urgency should always considered with more importance (Mahdavi-Mazdeh 2012). For Bill, his life is more important than following ethical rules. If Bill agrees to have a kidney from the clinic, he will get a sold kidney, which is an illegal procedure, but he will have a greater life expectancy, once he receives the kidney transplanted. In the Australian guidelines for the kidney transplantation, there is a consideration, especially applicable for the urgent patients. In rare circumstances, if the patient in the waiting list is deemed to be urgent and his survival is threatened, the patient is considered under the urgent status, which provides him the opportunity to wait lesser for getting a compatible kidney (The Transplantation Society of Australia and New Zealand, 2016). However, the decision to give him the urgent status is based on his health status review by the states transplant advisory committee. Once, Bill is considered as urgent, it can be expected that except any compelling reason, the first compatible kidney would be offered to him. In this way, he can avoid the long 8 years waiting and can get a 10 years life expectancy. This process will also follow the ethical and legal procedure of transplantation (Mamzer-Bruneel et al. 2012). In this context, his physician would be accountable for arranging his medical condition review and evaluation for his status by the state transplantation advisory committee and guiding Bill towards the appropriate legal and ethical procedure (Land and Dossetor 2012). On other hand, cost of the illegal procedure of kidney transplantation is very high, which might not be affordable by Bill. He can consult with his family and can go through an assessment of his family members, if there is someone, compatible with his blood group and willing to save his life by direct donation, it will cut some of the huge cost for the organ transplantation process. In this context, proper laboratory tests for the willing family member of Bill is important for testing the compatibility with Bill. His physician should direct them towards the proper procedure of direct donation (Gordon 2012). If he gets a compatible family member who is willing to donate a kidney, proper informed consent process should be undergone. Moreover, the donor should be aware of the pros and cons of the organ donation and what complication he might have throughout the organ transplantation procedure (Truog 2005). Reference List Gordon, E.J., 2012. Informed consent for living donation: a review of key empirical studies, ethical challenges and future research. American Journal of Transplantation, 12(9), pp.2273-2280. Land, W. and Dossetor, J.B. eds., 2012. Organ Replacement Therapy: Ethics, Justice Commerce: First Joint Meeting of ESOT and EDTA/ERA Munich December 1990. Springer Science Business Media. Mahdavi-Mazdeh, M., 2012. The Iranian model of living renal transplantation. Kidney international, 82(6), pp.627-634. Mamzer-Bruneel, M.F., Laforet, E.G., Kreis, H., Thervet, ., Martinez, F., Snanoudj, R., Herve, C. and Legendre, C., 2012. [Renal transplantation: ethical issues]. Nephrologie therapeutique, 8(7), pp.547-556. The Transplantation Society of Australia and New Zealand,. 2016. Clinical Guidelines for Organ Transplantation from Deceased Donors. https://www.donatelife.gov.au/. Retrieved 5 November 2016, from https://www.donatelife.gov.au Truog, R.D., 2005. The ethics of organ donation by living donors. New England Journal of Medicine, 353(5), pp.444-446.