Debbie Andalo 

Doctors may turn away ‘irresponsible’ obese

Older people and patients who refuse to change their unhealthy lifestyle could be denied treatment under controversial proposals from the organisation which sets national clinical guidelines.
  
  


Older people and patients who refuse to change their unhealthy lifestyle may be denied treatment under controversial proposals from the organisation which sets national clinical guidelines.

The proposals from the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) now out for public consultation, have today outraged the Patients Association which has promised to challenge them in the courts if they are ever introduced.

The chairman of the Patients Association, Michael Summers, said today: "Whatever happened to the doctor's Hippocratic oath? We think it is wrong to encourage doctors to play god.

"These are quite disastrous ideas and if they go through I am sure there will be a legal challenge on a number of fronts. Any suggestions of this kind should be resisted very strongly."

The proposals appeared in a consultation document from Nice, which for the first time looks at which social values should underpin its decisions when drawing up national clinical guidelines. .

The report recommended that all patients should be treated equally regardless of age, gender, race, or socio-economic status.

But it said there should be exceptions to this principle if a patient's condition is "self -inflicted" and the "self-inflicted causes of the condition influences the likely outcome of the use of the intervention". The second exception should apply "where age is an indicator of benefit or risk". In these cases "age discrimination is appropriate", the report recommended.

The consultation document was drawn up by Nice following discussions with its 30-member Citizens Council.

A Nice spokesman said: "We are consulting on the social value judgements that we should or should not consider when we are drawing up guidelines, and we want to encourage a debate around these issues.

"This isn't about making any changes immediately, but it may influence the way that Nice develops as we take on a more public health view."

Nice chairman Sir Michael Rawlins accepted linking treatment to the age of the patient was controversial, but he said: "Somewhere along the line somebody has got to bite the bullet on this."

Sir Michael said society was polarised on the issue: "Some people think that we should give greater advantage to children because they have the rest of their lives to live and old people have had a fair innings. While others believe that old people shouldn't be discriminated against just because they are old."

But he pointed out that age discrimination worked both ways - and not always against the elderly. "If you consider flu vaccinations for example we offer them to the elderly because they are the ones who benefit, but we don't offer it to young people because they don't get that incapacitated from flu."

The principle to link treatment to whether the condition was "self inflicted" could apply to cases where patients were smokers or were obese, he said.

"I think broadly people accept that they have responsibility for their own health - that they have to take some role in that as well as the state. If you ask the taxpayer they will think that is reasonable."

Sir Michael said there would be exceptions; for example a smoker would not be denied a heart bypass operation.

The report is out for public consultation until June 30.

 

Leave a Comment

Required fields are marked *

*

*