Medical Law coursework Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Medical Law coursework - raise ExampleThe right of younger children to provide independent go for is proportionate to their competence, but a childs duration alone is clearly an unreliable predictor of his or her competence to make decisions. A belief in the High Court in 1983 laid down criteria for establishing whether a child, irrespective of age, had the capacity to provide legitimate consent to treatment in specified circumstances. Two years later these criteria were approved in the theatre of operations of Lords and became widely acknowledged as the Gillick test, after the name of a mother who had challenged health service counselor that would have allowed her daughters aged under 16 to receive confidential contraceptive advice without her knowledge.As long agone as 1969 the Family Law Reform Act declared that consent to medical treatment given by a minor of 16 shall be as effective as it would be if he were of generous age, (1969) and in much(prenominal) cases parenta l consent need not be obtained. The empowered children to make informed decisions based on their competence and capacity.This view of childrens legal rights have been strengthened in Gillick v. West Norfolk & Wisbech playing field Health Authority (1985) where House of Lords ruling declared that parental responsibility diminishes as child acquires unresolved understanding to make his own decisions and that at common Law a child of sufficient parole and understanding could consent to treatment, notwithstanding the absence of parents consent. This judgment clearly and expressly declared that a come to might provide contraception to minor under sixteen with or without her parents consent. The law did not bring in any rule of absolute parental authority until a fixed age parental rights were accepted by the law only as long as they were needed for the protection of the child and such rights yielded to the childs right to make his own decisions when he reached a sufficient unders tanding and intelligence to be capable of making up his own mind. This has to be an exercise backed by sound clinical judgment taking into consideration what is best for the patients health. This was further supported by Healths Guidelines for Ethics Committee (1991) which holds that parental consent cannot override a competent childs refusal of consent. This was also supported in 1984 by the British Medical Associations philosophy and Practice of Medical Ethics (1988) which advises that physicians may provide contraceptive to mentally mature women under sixteen without parental notification or consent if that clinically serves the patients best interest. (Kessel, 1993 )Here the conflict is between self-sufficiency and dependency, which characterizes the legal position of the minors. This lays emphasis on the rights to decide on the matters of sexuality, reproduction, partnership, marriage and parenthood which are influenced and exceptional by parental rights and also affected by state regulation. This leads to the more pertinent question of the companionable rights of minors around the issue of sex education, as one of the most controversial subjects investigated.