OK, I'll admit it. I watch the melodramatic soap opera that is Grey's Anatomy. And something struck me while I watched last week's episode: coercion by doctors. In one scene, one of the doctors talked a young woman into the shoulder surgery she needed by telling her she would have a hunchback on her wedding day if she didn't have the surgery. In another scene, another doctor talked a patient into a risky heart surgery by telling the patient, an avid birdwatcher, i was the only way he could live to see a rare bird.
Of course, this screams coercion and doesn't even remotely resemble anything like informed consent or patient autonomy. But in both scenes, the doctors were looked highly upon by their colleagues and supervisors for talking the patients into the surgeries.
It makes me wonder, is this how people see doctors? It's not like this show is written by doctors. It is written by people who have interacted with the health care system as patients or as family members of patients. Do people see doctors as coercive and paternalistic? And no one on the show seemed outraged by this coercion. Do people think this paternalism is OK? Or do they not expect autonomy in medical decision-making because they have yet to truly experience it themselves?
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