Doctors shouldn’t lie to their patients, even now when the parsing of words and the telling of white lies is common at the highest level of our government. But they do it all the time — sometimes for personal reasons but most of the time for what they believe is the good of their patients.
As a neonatologist and a pediatric cardiologist, we know that truth and honesty are key parts of the foundation of the doctor-patient relationship. “Commitment to honesty with patients” is a primary responsibility for physicians set out in the Charter on Medical Professionalism.
Yet physicians — including us — do lie.
We have said to parents of newborns, “She will sleep through the night,” or, “Your breast milk will come in any day now,” knowing there is a distinct possibility that neither might happen.
We have said to parents with children in the cardiac intensive care unit, intubated and sedated after major heart surgery, “He isn’t in pain; he knows that you’re here,” when we have little idea whether such awareness is possible in states of induced coma and paralysis.
We have said to parents whose infant has features of a lethal genetic abnormality, “She is beautiful and perfect,” when there is nothing else to say.
And we have said to parents who desperately rushed to their dying baby’s bedside, “He is still here,” while placing him in their arms and shutting off the monitor so they can’t see that his heart is no longer beating.
We tell these untruths not to deceive parents, but to offer words that lighten their hearts in moments of despair. We do it, we tell ourselves, to spare their feelings.
But perhaps we sometimes lie for our own sake, and it is our feelings that need to be spared so we can get through the night without breaking down in the call room when all signs indicate the outcome will not be good.
The dilemma is not new.
In 2012, a nationwide survey showed that one-third of the 1,981 physicians sampled said they should not necessarily share serious medical errors with their patients. Two-fifths of the doctors did not disclose their financial relationships with drug and device companies to patients. These sorts of lies are clearly harmful and transparency is necessary.
Some physicians lie to third-party payers to obtain approval for treatments or procedures their patients need. Their willingness to deceive payers varies by disease severity: 58 percent said they would do this for coronary bypass surgery and 35 percent for screening mammography, but just 2.5 percent for cosmetic rhinoplasty — a nose job.
In an imperfect health care system limited by resources, the morality of whether physicians should advance what they believe is in the best interest of their patients above and beyond existing rules and regulations can be debated.
Yet white lies are also problematic. Medical ethicists have argued for decades on the moral distinction between lying and deception, and physicians have long struggled with absolute honesty versus withholding dismal facts.
One study found that more than 55 percent of physicians sometimes or often described a patient’s prognosis in a more positive manner than the facts support. A deception flowchart has been developed to help doctors “who are not absolutist” decide when it is morally acceptable for them to deceive patients.
In reality, the flowchart, or saying “I don’t know,” doesn’t always help. And being brutally honest doesn’t always help families make decisions or guarantee the preferred outcome. We could — and should — dutifully cite statistics of morbidities and mortality to families, such as, “Your child has a 60 percent chance of survival.” As physicians, we may feel that at least they heard the numbers. But for families, survival is a dichotomous yes or no. Giving hope and sometimes describing a prognosis in a more positive manner than the facts might support is the reality of what physicians do.
To be sure, deception that limits an individual’s or a parent’s ability to make informed decisions is reprehensible. Sugar-coating devastating results, or making light of grave situations as if there will be meaningful recovery is also wrong. Patients and their family members must be told results and expectations based on experience and evidence, as honestly and as clearly as a clinician can. But the art of medicine calls upon us to be nuanced and possibly shield them from unnecessary pain.
The foundations of a doctor-patient relationship can remain strong even with “white lies,” as long as our actions are grounded in kindness and we are doing our best for our patients in difficult times.
Nana Matoba, M.D., is a neonatologist at the Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago and an assistant professor of pediatrics in Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine. Angira Patel, M.D., is a pediatric cardiologist at the Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, an assistant professor of pediatrics and medical education and member of the Center for Bioethics and Medical Humanities at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. Both authors are Public Voice Fellows through The OpEd Project.
My family has three doctors in it. They never lied. Many will use lies to gain trust or money .
They need a strict law for these doctors
Doctors need stricter background checks and not just any idiot handed a license and degree .
medical professional, doctor’s I thought I had right to know and understand what was happening to my body. I thought doctor’s I trusted would uphold their duty to Informed Consent signed by me and doctor’s they should of explained in details so I could understand all procedures. Patient Rights I could agree to or disagree and seek other opinions. ( (Never happened) That papers records show they
knowingly and premeditated what they were about to do before surgery. Doctor’s wrongfully up coding diagnosing , and not following standards and procedures show set by company Nuvasive making gross errors during a 2 MASSIVELY INVASIVE OPEN SPINE RECONSTRUCTION PROCEDURES , “when no intervention was needed to happen they destroyed my spine “, they caused more damage , less then a year required a 3rd open reconstruction surgery not a revision the doctor’s causes Catastrophic injury and physical harm emotionally abused. I only found out about negligence by seeing a Surgeon for the pain. 8 fusions sites never happen ever in adults
He said OMG WHAT DOCTOR WOULD OF EVEN HAVE DONE THAT TO A HUMAN BEING SPINE. Nothing was needed to happen to destroy your life
Now I’m semi disabled handicapped because of doctor’s. No informing me what they were doing to my spine. I did not even told or knew who the Lead Surgeon was in the OR he had no consent to touch my body or did I know what he was about to do my spine before surgery I never heard of saw the words TOTAL RECONSTRUCTION. and left off two screws. That failed.
I’m disabled handicapped no official person care.
Lives don’t matter
Doctors need to be held accountable for lies and deception. Doctors kept telling me steroid treatments was safe. Now I have diabetes and found put steroids hurt the pancreas which causes high blood sugar.
I agree 100%. Most of the medicine that doctors prescribe is worse than the condition it is treating. I had one doctor that couldn’t tell me what the side effects of the medication he was prescribing. I just walked out.
Only a sociopath or psychopath would lie to a patient. A decent person would not lie. Lying can cost a life. Never trust a person who will lie to you if you care about your life.
A lie is a lie, and a lie always hurts the human spirit.
Good one they killed my soul and destroyed my spine and they get away with it because they LIED
This is one deeply disturbing article. The examples of ‘beneficial’ lies provided underscore the unthinking paternalism of doctors. That’s the most generous interpretation.
*Tell parents that a newborn is ‘perfect’ when they have a lethal genetic defect? Why? For maximum blood chilling impact when a DIFFERENT doctor rips the rug of ignorance out from under them? So they’ll be as attached and blindsided as possible in the moment when someone explains that all that guilt and confusion they have experienced-due to the baby’s distress, or the baby’s distressing failure to thrive-was because the baby was doomed all along? No, actually the reason a doctor does this is so that SOMEONE ELSE can be responsible for giving Mom and Dad the sad news. The doctor in these sorts of situations is lying to themselves about their motives, at best.
*Telling parents to expect a baby to sleep though the night at an age when that won’t happen does what exactly? The doctor’s lie insures that the parents will be concerned that something might be wrong with the baby. Whatever the doctor’s motive, the doctor generates needless anxiety. The parents will be more likely to make unnecessary doctor’s visits and maybe consent to unnecessary tests.
More $$$ for the hospital though. The lactation example is more of the same.
*Hand the Mother a baby’s corpse and turn off the flat-lined heart monitor so that the grieving parents stands there wondering whether the child is or isn’t dead, unsure what to do or say? The parents are probably not stupid. They will suspect the doctor is lying. This uncertainty-while they tearfully look at the unbreathing body-gives the doctor time to slip out of the room and let SOMEONE ELSE inform the parents that yes, their disturbingly dead-looking baby is actually dead.
Good article. I have begun a push with my congressmen to start a bill in Ohio to prevent doctors from lying to patients. A tough one after reading your article. I’m more concerned with doctor’s lying about conditions as you did note, as well as stating that they are required by law to perform unnecessary tests. I have one doctor who is so blatant as they have a sign by the TV saying that is in violation of HIPPA to change the TV channels. I bring up the stupidity of that sign to each patient in the waiting room when I visit. 🙂
You might doubt that doctors lie to patients, ’till you experience it yourself. In 2009 a dear one was diagnosed with malignant breast cancer (mammography, ultrasound and double biopsy). Three months later, after she’d refused (very) strongly advised mastectomy/chemotherapy by her oncologist, she went back for a second ultrasound examination (to the same hospital that carried out the mammography) and they concluded that the situation had remained ‘quasi identical’ compared to three months earlier… This conclusion was put on paper. When I compared the images (by use of the two CD’s of these ultrasounds) it didn’t take long to see that something was wrong: the dark spots from the first ultrasound (representing two tumors, both later confirmed to be malignant breast cancer) had nearly disappeared on the second ultrasound CD, ONLY the measurements on the images had remained the same! Another ultrasound, performed THREE DAYS later, in another town and by an independent radiologist, confirmed my suspicion that the two tumors were gone! We showed this doctor the two earlier ultrasound images and the result of the double biopsy and he insisted to perform one more ultrasound. The conclusion was the same: the images from the first ultrasound were nowhere to be found and he could only shake his head about the second ultrasound (the one that supposedly confirmed that the situation had remained ‘quasi identical’ at that moment in time, three months after the first ultrasound). This patient is still in more than good health now, 9 years later, and praises herself very lucky that we found out in time how crooked the medical system really is (still hard to believe, even for me who personally witnessed it, but facts are facts). This led me to take a closer look at the medical system and I can only say that it’s one big sickness industry that preys on the ignorance (and misguided trust) of innocent victims, us, the people… They lie and withhold information from us in order to keep their lucrative business going. Here’s one massive study that clearly shows up to 54% of all breast cancer spontaneously going away on it’s own IF NEVER DETECTED: “Therefore, for every 100 nonpalpable cancers found through mammography alone, 54 would presumably have gone away (174 / 324 × 100 = 54%)” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3320224/
You’re kidding, right? Physicians lie all the time. I worked in the industry for 15 years and it is a common practice. They will lie right to your face. They will lie in the Medical Record, and they will by omission, by ordering an unneeded procedure in order to obfuscate a medical error that they lied about. The question posed in this article is a joke. If this is the best you can do, you need to get into another business, because you certainly are not in the business of journalism. Maybe National Inquirer type at best.