This Article Full Text Full Text (PDF) Submit an eLetter Alert me when this article is cited Alert me when eLetters are posted Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Request Permissions Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Rao, S. V. Articles by Kim, S. Y.H. Search for Related Content PubMed Articles by Rao, S. V. Articles by Kim, S. Y.H. Related Collections Related Article

Editorials

Informing the Consent Process

Sunil V. Rao, MD and Scott Y.H. Kim, MD, PhD

From the Duke Clinical Research Institute, Durham, NC (S.V.R.), and Bioethics Program, Center for Behavioral and Decision Sciences in Medicine, and Department of Psychiatry, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor (S.Y.H.K.).

Correspondence to Sunil V. Rao, MD, 508 Fulton St (111A), Durham, NC 27705. E-mail sunil.rao@duke.edu

Key Words: Editorials • informed consent • outcome assessment

An extract of the first 250 words of the full text is provided, because this article has no abstract.

Because the legal and ethical aspects of informed consent are often foremost in clinicians’ minds, it is easy to forget that the purpose of informed consent is to aid in decision making. Informed consent forms, for example, are often written with legal and institutional priorities in mind,¹ and patients in turn assume that the primary purpose of such forms is to protect physicians and their institutions.² Indeed, it is understandable that clinicians may take little intrinsic interest in the informed consent process when seen as an external legal requirement.

Article See p 21

What would happen if the informed consent process were truly seen as an opportunity for optimizing decision making? The traditional attempts at improving informed consent tend to focus only on patient outcomes, typically on whether their factual understanding or satisfaction improves. In this issue of Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes, Arnold and colleagues³ describe their initial experience using a Web-based individualized risk assessment tool (the Patient Refined Expectations for Deciding Invasive Cardiac Treatments [PREDICT]) as part of the informed consent process for percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). The results of their study show that, in comparison with historical controls, patients undergoing the customized consent were in general much more involved (and perceived themselves to be so) in the consent process, and, interestingly, the customized consent seems to have affected the choice of stents used. These data suggest that a consent process that successfully engages the clinician and patient affects not only the patient’s perception of informed consent . . . [Full Text of this Article]

Related Article

Converting the Informed Consent From a Perfunctory Process to an Evidence-Based Foundation for Patient Decision Making

Suzanne V. Arnold, Carole Decker, Homaa Ahmad, Olawale Olabiyi, Surya Mundluru, Kimberly J. Reid, Gabriel E. Soto, Sarah Gansert, and John A. Spertus
Circ Cardiovasc Qual Outcomes 2008 1: 21-28. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

This article has been cited by other articles:

				H. M. Krumholz One Year at Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes Circ Cardiovasc Qual Outcomes, September 1, 2009; 2(5): 399 - 401. [Full Text] [PDF]

				H. M. Krumholz Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes: Scholarship to Improve Health and Health Care for Patients and Populations Circ Cardiovasc Qual Outcomes, September 1, 2008; 1(1): 1 - 3. [Full Text] [PDF]