新的美国妇产科医师学会(ACOG)监测指南引入了一种新的胎儿心率描记解释类别,介于令人放心和不放心之间。即中间。目的是减少不必要的剖宫产。医学指南的法律作用是矛盾的。供应商应该熟悉这些准则,而且还要锻炼患者的临床判断。实践偏离准则需要理由,但不考虑患者情况的简单依从性可能构成疏忽。一些法院遵循医学专业准则,但是其他人认为专业标准是法律规定的,不是职业本身。与医学科学的结论不同,可以继续审查,法院只确定一次案件的事实,在审判中。迫使患者遵守基于指南的医疗建议的诉讼可能会失败,起诉也可以,在美国更常见,蔑视这种建议的病人。
The new American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists\' (ACOG) monitoring
guidelines introduce a new category of interpretation of fetal heart rate tracings between reassuring and nonreassuring, namely intermediate. The purpose is to reduce unnecessary cesarean deliveries. The legal role of medical
guidelines is ambivalent. Providers are expected to be familiar with such
guidelines, but also to exercise clinical judgment in their patients\' interests. Practice departing from
guidelines requires justification, but simple compliance without regard to patients\' circumstances may constitute negligence. Some courts defer to medical professional
guidelines, but others hold that professional standards are set as a matter of law, not by the profession itself. Unlike conclusions in medical science, which are open to continuing review, courts determine facts in a case only once, at trial. Litigation to compel patients\' compliance with medical advice based on guidelines may fail, as may prosecutions, more common in the US, of patients who defy such advice.