On the medical front it’s actually a big consideration for us. If we give someone benzos and then someone tries to get consent for a non-emergent endoscopy, for example, that consent may not be valid. The level of “intoxication” someone has before we don’t consider informed consent valid is pretty low.
Exactly! That would not be described as voluntary intoxication for this example, you as the hospital are responsible for his state.
If a person came in via the ambulance because they are in the midst of an episode of alcohol poisoning and are non-verbal, do you wait to take action until they can consent? You see what I’m saying?
No, but let’s say that same person came in with a report of vomiting blood, suggesting esophageal varacies which are common in alcoholics due to hepatic portal hypertension but their hematocrit is stable. The next course of action would be to perform an upper endoscopy to see if those varacies are treatable before they really pop and the person bleeds out. That procedure would require informed consent, since it’s not emergent even if it is a direct threat to their survival.
On the medical front it’s actually a big consideration for us. If we give someone benzos and then someone tries to get consent for a non-emergent endoscopy, for example, that consent may not be valid. The level of “intoxication” someone has before we don’t consider informed consent valid is pretty low.
“If we give someone benzos…”
Exactly! That would not be described as voluntary intoxication for this example, you as the hospital are responsible for his state.
If a person came in via the ambulance because they are in the midst of an episode of alcohol poisoning and are non-verbal, do you wait to take action until they can consent? You see what I’m saying?
No, but let’s say that same person came in with a report of vomiting blood, suggesting esophageal varacies which are common in alcoholics due to hepatic portal hypertension but their hematocrit is stable. The next course of action would be to perform an upper endoscopy to see if those varacies are treatable before they really pop and the person bleeds out. That procedure would require informed consent, since it’s not emergent even if it is a direct threat to their survival.