Professional Standards & Ethics Flashcards
7 cards from real ABA practice questions. Tap to flip, then mark Knew It or Still Learning — missed cards come back until you master them.
Read the first 7 Professional Standards & Ethics flashcards as text
An anesthesiologist discovers an error made by a colleague that caused preventable patient harm but was not reported. The ethical course of action is:
Answer: Report the incident through the appropriate institutional quality improvement channel
Patient safety and honesty obligations require reporting adverse events through institutional channels to enable system-level learning and patient disclosure.
The ASA's Statement on Racial and Ethnic Disparities primarily obligates anesthesiologists to:
Answer: Recognize and actively work to eliminate bias affecting clinical decision-making and outcomes
The ASA calls on anesthesiologists to actively recognize implicit bias and work to eliminate disparities that result in inequitable patient outcomes.
Under what condition is it ethically permissible for an anesthesiologist to breach patient confidentiality without consent?
Answer: When disclosure is required to prevent serious, imminent harm to an identifiable third party
The Tarasoff duty and similar frameworks permit—or in some jurisdictions require—breach of confidentiality to prevent serious, imminent, identifiable harm to a third party.
Which behavior MOST exemplifies the ethical obligation of self-regulation in anesthesiology?
Answer: Voluntarily seeking evaluation when experiencing signs of burnout or substance use
Self-regulation includes honest self-assessment and voluntarily seeking help for impairing conditions before they compromise patient care.
When a research anesthesiologist publishes data selectively omitting unfavorable results, this constitutes:
Answer: Research misconduct through selective reporting
Selective omission of unfavorable data misrepresents research findings and constitutes research misconduct, regardless of IRB approval status.
A patient asks the anesthesiologist about an experimental regional technique not yet standard of care. The anesthesiologist's ethical duty is to:
Answer: Provide complete information including that it is experimental, its risks, and available standard alternatives
Informed consent requires full disclosure of experimental status, specific risks, and available proven alternatives to support genuine patient autonomy.
An anesthesiologist who is impaired by fatigue after a 28-hour call period is asked to start an elective case. The ethically and professionally appropriate response is:
Answer: Decline and arrange for a rested colleague to provide care
Fatigue sufficient to impair judgment creates an obligation to withdraw from elective cases and transfer care, prioritizing patient safety over professional inconvenience.