The new medical conversation : media, patients, doctors, and the ethics of scientific communication / Dennis J. Mazur.

Lanham : Rowman & Littlefield Pub., [2003], ©2003.

xvi, 187 pages ; 24 cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Pt. 1. Key points needed for better communication. Introduction. Media, science, doctors, and patients. Basic terms. The ethics of scientific communication : its interdisciplinary nature. Perspectives on information and the scientist, the social scientist, and the philosopher. The new medical conversation and the scientific information message. The circumscription of information by the courts. Expanded senses of information by ethicists and a psychiatrist. Bioethicists' respond to the judicial doctrine of informed consent. Information, cultures, and caution -- Pt. 2. How information reaches patients. What has been learned in research studies about "information" in the new medical conversation? Complex risk information : genetic information and future generations -- Pt. 3. Communicating risk-benefit information today. Truth and bias in the way information is presented. The move toward providing patients with "more information" of "different types" -- Pt. 4. Communicating risk-benefit information in the future. Egalitarian approaches to information. Research on communication in the patient-physician relationship. The longer information message : toward a fuller understanding of the "range of information" being discussed. Decision support for patients : it's here, but what is it, why is it here, whom is it supposed to benefit, and where is it going? Summary and conclusions.