Atul Gawande Whose Body Is It Anyway Analysis

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Atul Gawande in his article “Whose body is it, anyway?” introduced couple of cases, which discussed a controversial topic, doctors dealing with patients and making important medical decisions. These are difficult decisions in which people might have life or death choices. Who should make the important decisions, patients or doctors? Patients don’t usually know what is better for their health and while making their decisions, they might ignore or don’t know the possible side effects and consequences of these decisions. Doctors and physicians have more and better knowledge than normal people about human body and they are able to assist their patients while making tough decisions. However, they can not always make the right decision. Doctors can not predict the result of a surgery or a treatment and they do not have enough confidence of the result because sometimes the surgery could go in a way they didn’t expect. Although patients have the right to decide their treatments, doctors and patients should share …show more content…

They would do anything in order to live longer, ignoring that they might suffer or die because of the decision. In the case of Joseph Lazaroff, the doctor discovered tumors in his spine. Lazaroff had two choices, either having the surgery to remove the tumors or doing nothing about it. His doctor explained to him the consequences of the surgery that there was a risk of affecting his legs or dying. Even though Lazeroff knew about the risks, he chose to undergo the surgery and took the risk of dying to live. The result was a successful operation but Lazeroff died while recovering (Gawande P.87). Lazeroff thought he was making the right decision but it want bad. The doctor knew the result of the surgery in Lazeroff’s condidtion and he knew that Lazeroff was at risk of dying. Therefore, he should have disagreed with the patient’s decision or refused to do the surgery to avoid such a thing from