ELT selection Flashcards
1
Q
Exotic lifesaving treatments
A
- any number of lifesaving treatments where demand is greater than availability
2
Q
Rescher’s two stages
A
- Criteria of inclusion/exclusion decides who the candidates for ELT are
- criteria of selection: decides who gets the ELT
3
Q
Process of selection - Recher’s criteria framework
A
- simple: all parties understand the process
- plausible: patently reasonable to all - can’t be obviously unfair
- rationally defensible: fair
4
Q
Stage one: inclusion/exclusion
A
- constituency factor: a hospital can exclude a patient who isn’t a “client” in some relevant sense of that word
- adults go to a children’s hospital and are denied - Progress of science factor: a hospital can include patients based on staff research interests
- hospital has research for a specific type of cancer, and you have a different type - Prospect of success factor: hospital can exclude those which won’t be helped, it will just come back
5
Q
Stage two: criteria of selection
A
- Relative likelihood of success factor: individualized
- life expectancy factor: does the patient have long to live
- family role factor: is the person a mother/father
- potential future contribution factor: will the patient be valuable to society
- past services rendered factor: has the patient been valuable to society
6
Q
Problem with stage two: criteria of selection
A
- not all the same type of factor
- some are objectively biomedical and can be calculated (1 and 2), other are not (3-5)
7
Q
Who should decide ELT selection
A
- question still stands
- should legislators be involved?
- should doctors?
- should philosophers?
8
Q
Rescher’s conclusion
A
- we need some system of ELT selection, but there is no “best” system possible
- many are possible, but none are optimal
- suggested: a point system, plus randomness for those with roughly equal point totals… a “lottery of life and death”
