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If There's a Will, is There a Way?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 April 2021

Arthur L. Caplan
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Extract

The recent Report of the Massachusetts Task Force on Organ Transplantation represents a watershed in public policy formulation in the health care field. The Report reflects the views of a diverse group drawn from fields which include public health, religion, surgery, law, private industry and consumer affairs. As such, it is, happily, unlike nearly every other advisory study of health care technology that has been commissioned by federal or state bodies during the past twenty-five years.

All too often, assessments of medical technology commissioned by government or publicly funded scientific agencies, such as the National Institutes of Health, the Office of Technology Assessment, or the Public Health Service, have been confined to the views of “experts” in the area of technology being assessed.

Type
Article
Information
Law, Medicine and Healthcare , Volume 13 , Issue 1 , February 1985 , pp. 32 - 34
Copyright
© 1985 American Society of Law, Medicine & Ethics

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References

See, e.g., Kolata, G.B., Liver Transplants Endorsed, Science 221(4606): 221 (July 8, 1983) (example of the usual consensus panel process at the National Institutes of Health).Google ScholarPubMed
See Wehr, E., National Health Policy Sought for Organ Transplant Surgery, Congressional Quarterly 42(8): 453, 453–58 (February 25, 1984) (discussion of the resistance of the American Medical Association and the American Hospital Association to establishing federal standards for undertaking organ transplants).Google Scholar
Caplan, A.L., Organ Transplants: The Costs of Success, Hastings Center Report 13(6): 23–32 (December 1983).Google Scholar
In a story about the Baby Fae xenograft, it is reported that Charles McCarthy, Director of the Office for Protection from Research Risks at the National Institutes of Health, declined to review the informed consent and research protocol used at Loma Linda Medical Center. McCarthy stated: “It is not NIH policy to investigate research work performed without federal fundshellip; See Breo, D.L., Interview with Baby Fae's Surgeon, American Medical News, November 16, 1984, at 16. Unless NIH policy is changed, or unless an individual institution's institutional review board chooses to engage in review, research conducted with private funds will not be subject to review by IRBs or, if it does not involve new drugs or devices, by the Food and Drug Administration or any other federal agency.Google Scholar