jdm33351

Yesterday I got into a debate with one of my clinical instructors (who's also a pal of mine, by the way) about who is ultimately responsible for what happened to the kid in this news article. http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20031219/ap_on_he_me/hopkins_potassium_death In case the link doesn't work, it is a news item about a 2 year old oncology pt at Johns Hopkins. The little girl's IV was overloaded with K+ and she died from hyperkalemia. The instructor insists its the nurse's fault because he/she was responsible for monitoring the pt and keeping the physician up to speed about what's going on. He also insists that the nurse is ultimately responsible because it was he/she who administered the IV and not the physician. That may be true but isn't the physician equally to blame? My question is, how could they arbitrarily give a K+ loaded IV over a three day period, especially to a 2 year old kid, and not notice ANY signs of hyperkalemia? Any comments?

I read this story on Yahoo news today and when I first saw the headline I thought the guy was a psycho. But it turns out the murders were actually mercy killings. Would you help a terminally ill patient die, especially if you felt no one would ever find out what you did? I remember that when this issue came up in medical ethics there was a heated debate about whether it should be more morally acceptable to watch terminally ill patients suffer than to help them end their misery sooner. I'm curious to know everyone's thoughts about this.