The Question of Autonomy in the "student Doctor" and a Wary Patient

The Question of Autonomy in The "Student Doctor" and a Wary

Patient

The "Student Doctor" and a Wary Patient brings to light an

interesting dilemma in the medical field, which is: "How do

we introduce young doctors to hands-on experience without

sacrificing the quality of practice in hospitals?" This is a

problem whose intricacies are exposed when James Denton, the

young student doctor in our case, is confronted with the need

to put his patient at ease and act with confidence, while at

the same time not sacrificing the patient's autonomy by

misinforming him (which, unfortunately, Denton fails to

protect). The ultimate question is, "At what point and by

what method can Denton achieve balance between autonomy and

beneficence?" Most would agree honesty is a staple in ethics,

and I maintain that holds true here. James Denton is verily

bound to be honest, and by doing so he may very well account

for the patient's well being, as well as his right to know

what is being done to his body.

As part of Denton's training, we assume that he must

gain experience dealing with his patients one-on-one and

project confidence, and his attempt succeeds perhaps too

well. He introduces himself as a "student doctor," which is

certainly honest, but whether the patient does not catch

this, or simply only hears "doctor," before you know it he's

calling Denton "doctor" and asking questions that assume a

certain degree of experience. Furthermore, he clearly brings

up his distrust for the student doctor population, which

makes Denton even more uncomfortable. This is clearly an

unfortunate situation, as the patients' fear is probably

weakly founded and more than slightly unreasonable, and

Denton