Responses to Group 2

Source: Ch. 6 Physician Impairment: University Hospital Case Study

The Tracks We Leave: Ethics and Management Dilemmas in Health Care, 3 rd. ed.

Respond to this Reputation:

In each question response, try to include the following:

• Risk Recommendation. Evaluate and discuss the pros and cons of the proposed recommendation of the group in light of the potential impacts. Make recommendations for improvements to better limit legal, financial, hospital, and reputational risk.
• Issues Recommendation. Evaluate how well the proposal addressed all of the issues on the Ethics Committee Group Issues list for the group. Make recommendations to fill in the gaps.
• Compliance tool and Managerial action Recommendation. Make a recommendation for use of a compliance tool and managerial action linked to the compliance tool not discussed by the other group.

Innovation Recommendation. Make an innovative recommendation of how to modify or change the proposed recommendation to make it stronger. This recommendation for improvement should consider innovative solutions.

Group 2 document

Physician Impairment

The University Hospital convened an ethics committee to discuss Dr. Spalding and the possible impacts of his recent impairment. Unfortunately, the trauma surgeon, Dr. Spalding, failed to respond on time while on call, arriving about three hours late to supervise an emergency surgery (Perry, 2020, Chapter 6). Additionally, the physician presented with slurred speech and drunk (Perry, 2020, Chapter 6).

Thankfully, the patient suffered no apparent medical injury from the unsupervised splenectomy and liver laceration repair by the resident physician (Perry, 2020, Chapter 6). Still, the resident and OR supervisor should have called another surgeon to supervise the surgery or notified the administration of any current or prior impairment concerns (Perry, 2020, Chapter 6). The hospital and patient could have faced significant legal penalties and reputational damage related to patient safety and quality care concerns, requiring an examination of the safety, legal, and ethical implications and committee recommendations (Showalter, 2020).