A health authority applied for a High Court declaration that it would be lawful to undertake an emergency caesarean operation on MB whose foetus was found to be in the breech position after MB agreed to have the operation theoretically but refused in practice due to her fear of needles. The declaration was granted, and …Read more

Mr. and Mrs. Blood were married and attempting to have a family. Unfortunately, Mr. Blood contracted meningitis and went into a coma prior to any conception, so Mrs. Blood requested that doctors take sperm by electro-ejaculation while Mr. Blood was in the coma. The doctors took two different samples, and Mr. Blood passed away soon …Read more

Respondents, physicians operating in New York and gravelly-ill patients (who had died prior to the appeal), asserted that, though it was consistent with the standards of medical practice to “prescribe lethal medication for ‘mentally competent, terminally ill patients’ who are suffering great pain and desire a doctor’s help in taking their own lives, they [were] …Read more

Under the Wash. Rev. Code §9A36.060 (1) it was a crime to cause or aid another person to commit suicide. In 1996, a lower court struck down this law on the basis it violated an individual’s constitutionally protected right to choose the time and manner of death. The petitioners, the State of Washington and its …Read more

In 1977, Julie Breen had a bilateral augmentation mammoplasty which involved the insertion of a silicone implant in each of her breasts. She later developed a complication in the way of bilateral breast capsules. In 1978, she sought the opinion of Dr. Cholmondeley Williams, who had not performed the original procedure. Dr. Williams advised Breen …Read more

While a prisoner in custody of the defendant, the plaintiff was informed by the prison nurse in the presence of other prisoners that he was to undergo a blood test for HIV and that he had the right to refuse such test. This information was repeated to the plaintiff in a closed consulting room, but …Read more

The child “B” had a long history of unsuccessful treatments fo her cancer. In January 1995,  B suffered a further relapse of acute myeloid leukaemia. Both the doctor who oversaw B’s treatment since the initial diagnosis and the doctor who performed a prior bone marrow transplant agreed that the child had approximately six to eight …Read more

Plaintiffs, Michael Sean Rizzo Sr. and Pamela Rizzo, filed this action against defendant physician Maurice Schiller, who they alleged breached the standard of care owed to them with his negligent and nonconsensual use of obstetrical forceps during Mrs. Rizzo’s delivery. Pamela Rizzo was admitted to Fairfax Hospital on November 7th at 9:00am in active labor. …Read more

Mr. Bland was in the care of the health authority, and had been in a persistent vegetative state for three and a half years due to a severe crushed chest injury, which had caused devastating and permanent damage to the higher functions of his brain. He was being fed artificially by a tube inserted through …Read more

“Marion” was a fourteen year old girl with an “intellectual disability”, severe deafness, epilepsy, an ataxic gait and “behavioural problems”. She could not care for herself. Her parents proposed that Marion undertake a hysterectomy and an ovarienectomy (the Procedures). The hysterectomy was proposed to prevent natural pregnancy and menstruation and the psychological and behavioural consequences …Read more