title: Dignity and cost-effectiveness: analysing the responsibility for decisions in medical ethics.
abstract: In the operation of a health care system, defining the limits of medical care is the joint responsibility of many parties including clinicians, patients, philosophers and politicians. It is suggested that changes in the potential for prolonging life make it necessary to give doctors guidance which may have to incorporate certain features of utilitarianism, individualism and patient-autonomy.
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D004470:Economics, Medical; D028663:Ethical Theory; D004992:Ethics, Medical; D005065:Euthanasia; D005066:Euthanasia, Passive; D006801:Humans; D018579:Patient Selection; D026684:Personal Autonomy; D040841:Resource Allocation