Buckle up: Doctors will likely face ethical issues in the Trump era

President-elect Donald J. Trump will soon take office and he will likely make many changes to the healthcare policies of the Obama administration that will create ethical questions for physicians.

That's according to Arthur L. Caplan, Ph.D., of the division of Medical Ethics at the New York University Langone School of Medicine, who discussed the possible ethical issues in an interview on Medscape.

In addition to Trump's plans to immediately repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, Caplan predicted policy changes ahead for abortion rights.

Trump has said he will appoint a Supreme Court justice who would overturn Roe v. Wade, and many doctors and women fear for the future of abortion and reproductive rights. Although Caplan doesn't think it will be easy to overturn, he does believe there may be attempts to impose restrictions on the right to access an abortion.

He also predicted a different kind of fight over abortion rights will emerge in the next administration that focuses on technology allowing women to choose a medical abortion by using the morning-after pill. With telemedicine and the ability to buy those pills online, women will be able to choose a medical abortion no matter where they live in the United States, he said.

Another ethical issue that is likely to loom large, he said, is the right of people to dissent because of their personal beliefs and not take actions that violate their conscience. That raises ethical questions for physicians in states with laws that allow physician-assisted suicide.

Voters in Colorado approved a measure to allow physician-assisted suicide for dying patients in the November elections, making it the fifth state in the country with a similar law. Physicians will have to decide whether they will certify a patient as terminally ill and write the prescription to make drugs available so a patient can end his or her life. Doctors will need to know where they stand and let patients know their beliefs.

“There is room for conscience in what physicians do with respect to their patients. Patients have a right to know the limits and restrictions from the start,” he said. So, for instance, patients can seek out doctors whose values align with their own.