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Doctoring ICD/Pacemaker

Cardiology and stewardship — New post up at Medscape|Cardiology

One of the definitions of the noun steward is a person whose responsibility it is to take care of something. Wikipedia calls stewardship an “ethic that embodies the responsible planning and management of resources.” These apply well to cardiologists–who use powerful (and expensive) tools in the care of fellow humankind. The internal cardiac defibrillator, or […]

Categories
Doctoring ICD/Pacemaker

ICD and Pacemaker deactivation: It is neither physician-assisted suicide nor euthanasia

The purpose of this post is to clarify important issues about cardiac devices as they relate to deactivation. As I wrote yesterday, Paula Span of the NY Times covered this important issue earlier this week. Her coverage came about because of this Mayo Clinic paper published in JAMA-IM, which showed most patients with cardiac devices […]