Governing Physcician-Associated Risk Disclosure by Adopting the ADA "Direct Threat" Approach: Doctors, Pack Up Your Stethoscopes and Get Out Your Checkbooks
Rebecca Walker | 1997 U. Ill. L. Rev.
As today's patients become more savvy health care consumers, less willing to place their health in the hands of a stranger without research and investigation, physicians may find themselves on the hot seat. The pressing question, what and how much background and personal information must a physician provide, presents no easy answers. Although disclosure facilitates informed consumer decisions allowing prospective patients to evaluate the risks associated with prospective physicians, a governing mechanism is clearly necessary to provide parameters.
This note evaluates the proposal that the "serious threat" four-factor test from ADA cases could be utilized to determine which physician-associated risk factors should be disclosed. The author predicts that applying the ADA four-factor test to these risks factors would follow the same unhelpful trend as recent ADA cases applying the test in cases involving doctors and hospitals; any risk equals a significant risk. Predisposed to err on the cautious side, this analysis would deem all factors a significant risk warranting disclosure.