Issues in Law & Medicine

Children currently comprise just under 23% of our population but remain 100% of our future. It is therefore incumbent on us to ensure the most healthful future possible for them. This paper presents an evidence-based "K-12 Standard for Optimal Sexual Development" to encourage the education of children about sex risk avoidance (SRA) behaviors such as monogamy, relationship skills, and healthy psychological traits as an alternative to Comprehensive Sex Education (CSE) which is not based on age-appropriate sexual milestones or behaviors...

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) is the default professional organization for obstetricians and gynecologists in the United States. Unfortunately, ACOG's policy and treatment of abortion is more radical than a large section of the country's obstetricians and gynecologists. ACOG has functionally ceased to represent this section of physicians, as its voice no longer speaks in unison with theirs. Worse still, ACOG has actively opposed obstetricians and gynecologists who do not agree with their radical policy, or who advocate for individual rights to choose not to refer for abortion...

Overwhelming evidence from 168 studies over fifty years points to a clear dose-response relationship between surgical abortion and subsequent preterm birth. The 2018 National Academy of Sciences report considered only five of these 168 studies and represents a biased sample that underreports a significant association between surgical abortion and subsequent preterm birth. The purpose of this document is to review the quality of the data on this effect, review the size of this effect, and portray an accurate assessment of the data to improve informed consent prior to surgical abortion...

Evidence in peer-reviewed literature from 168 studies over fifty years points to a causal, dose-response relationship between surgical abortion and subsequent preterm birth. This document provides an overview of this literature, discusses mechanisms for this effect, demonstrates the strength of evidence for causality, and offers guidance for informed consent prior to surgical abortion. This document does not provide detailed statistical analysis or a high-resolution assessment of the quality of studies on surgical abortion and preterm birth (covered in Practice Guideline 11)...

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

In 2020, the rules governing the practice of abortion in Poland were narrowed and became some of the strictest in Europe. These new rules were the result of the Constitutional Court's oral announcement of its judgment in case K 1/20, making abortion for embryo-pathological reasons illegal. Thus, terminations of pregnancy in cases where prenatal tests and other medical findings indicated a high risk of a severe and irreversible damage to the foetus, or an incurable life-threatening ailment of the foetus, which in 2018 accounted for approximately 98% of all abortions in Poland, were declared illegal...

The U.S. Roman Catholic bishops have been earnest participants in the contemporary public policy debate on abortion. This article reviews the bishops' main policy documents in which the Church's teaching on abortion is applied, first, within the context of the debate on abortion policy that was underway in the states before Roe v. Wade , and, second, within the grave and challenging situation thereafter when a right to abortion was made the law of the land. Whether discussing court cases, statutory law, human life bills, or various proposals to amend the Constitution, the bishops raised up a broad vision of full protection in law for all human beings, born and unborn, and promoted a comprehensive program of education, pastoral care, public policy, and prayer...

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Knowledge and competency in the topics of reproductive health and family planning are important for primary care physicians. Given the high rates of unintended pregnancy, increasing rates of infertility and other gynecologic conditions, it is important for medical students, many of whom will become primary care physicians, to receive good foundational knowledge of reproductive health topics. The objective of this research project was to investigate the current curricula at US medical schools to determine the breadth and extent of education that medical students receive in reproductive health...

Peer-reviewed journals in the biological and life sciences literature have published articles that represent the biological view that a human's life begins at fertilization ("the fertilization view"). As those statements are typically offered without explanation or citation, the fertilization view seems to be uncontested by the editors, reviewers, and authors who contribute to scientific journals. However, Americans are split on whether the fertilization view is a "philosophical or religious belief" (45%) or a "biological and scientific fact" (46%), and only 38% of Americans view fertilization as the starting point of a human's life...

One in every 10,000 children is born with SMA and half of them will not even live two years. It is a hereditary genetic disorder, where the muscles die. If it is discovered just after birth, newborns can get the newest medicines to maintain their health. Unlike some other common genetic diseases (e.g. Down-Syndrome), SMA can be screened prior to pregnancy to determine whether the parents are carriers. In Hungary, people have urged reform, due to the baby Zente case, whose story has reached millions. Australia and Germany have also discovered the need for screenings...

INTRODUCTION: The opioid epidemic resulted in vast increase in neonatal opioid withdrawal syndrome (NOWS). To mitigate NOWS and opioid dependency among women, staff established a gender specific, patient driven, autonomy based, outpatient therapeutic substitution program. METHODS: Prospective observational study of obstetric patients receiving prenatal care 7/1/2016-12/31/2019. Patients underwent universal urine drug screens to identify illicit drug use with dependency and offered addiction counseling with voluntary outpatient therapeutic substitution in an obstetrical-addictions combined clinic to achieve abstinence with oral Buprenorphine tapering protocol...

Although discussions have begun regarding the ways in which healthcare providers and individuals in fields adjacent to healthcare might be exposed to legal sanctions involving COVID-19, the complete scope of the legal risks is still largely unknown. This essay explores how current laws in the United States fail to offer adequate protections: (1) to healthcare workers (HCW) practicing under significantly altered standards of care, and (2) to individuals involved in the allocation of scarce resource decision-making process...

UNLABELLED: This Guidance addresses the essential elements of informed consent to novel, provisionally registered COVID-19 vaccines which conform to the current definition of an investigational vaccine namely, lacking requirements for approval for full registration. 1 First, it addresses the ethical obtaining of informed consent in a setting of short and long term knowns and unknowns, by structuring the personal nature of informed consent into its twelve component parts. Second, as a guidance for family physicians, it explores reasonable medical concerns arising for individuals from both knowns and unknowns about COVID-19 disease and vaccines...

The American College of Pediatricians (ACPeds) maintains that it is unethical to intentionally harm an innocent human being even in the absence of the individual's ability to perceive pain. However, in this paper, ACPeds reviews the laboratory and clinical evidence which indicates that as early as 12 weeks gestation (and possibly earlier) exposure to noxious stimuli negatively affects immature human beings. Because of the resulting acute stress responses and subsequent potential long-term negative effects, the ACPeds holds that avoiding, mitigating, and directly treating fetal, neonatal, and pediatric pain is a medical and ethical obligation...

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

Americans have benefited from a declining cancer incidence and improving prognosis over the past two decades, during which time rising prices for anti-cancer drugs have proportionally outstripped rising expenditures for overall cancer care and total national health expenditures. To meet the economic challenges, remedies have been proposed to base compensation on relative survival measurements perhaps taking into account associated drug toxicities, disabilities, and disease progression. While there are advantages for knowing the economic costs determined from so-called, "value-based" methodologies, it must be recognized that the measured values are impersonal, incomplete, and always biased...

Although some persons with minority sexual orientations do not identify as lesbian, gay, or bisexual (LGB), Minority Stress Theory (Meyer, 2003) has largely been developed utilizing LGB-identified samples. We examined a sample ( n = 274) of sexual minorities with diverse religious and sexual identity labels to determine if those rejecting versus adopting an LGB identity were different in terms of religious, sexual, relational, and health characteristics. Results suggested those who reject an LGB identity are more likely to be religiously active, full members of their church, and highly intrinsic and theologically conservative in their religious viewpoint...

OBJECTIVES: Primary: Analyze the Adverse Events (AEs) reported to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) after use of mifepristone as an abortifacient. Secondary: Analyze maternal intent after ongoing pregnancy and investigate hemorrhage after mifepristone alone. METHODS: Adverse Event Reports (AERs) for mifepristone used as an abortifacient, submitted to the FDA from September 2000 to February 2019, were analyzed using the National Cancer Institute's Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (CTCAEv3)...

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

Since the U.S. Supreme Court issued its landmark decision in 1973 to legalize abortion, over 60 million preborn have been killed by elective abortion. While alive in the womb, these preborn are abandoned and not protected under current law. But once aborted, their body parts are a highly esteemed and prized commodity amongst certain members of the scientific community. Moral discourse is disregarded for the sake of science. The public have been lulled and lured into believing that this practice must continue in order to understand and develop cures for some of the most debilitating diseases of our day...