Patient’s right under Lisbon declaration

Social media is replete with stories of ailing prisoners being denied their request for health service in hospital facilities where they think they have access to the best medical care and physicians in whose hands they think they would have better chances of cure and survival.

Among the well-known personalities suffering such a painful experience are former president Gloria Arroyo and Janet Napoles. The request of former Senate president Juan Ponce Enrile’s family for his “house arrest,” where he could better recuperate after he shall have been considered out of danger by his doctors, could be another case.

After the Commission on Ethics of the Philippine Medical Association (PMA) cited Arroyo’s case, the courts relented. In the case of Napoles, Judge Elmo Alameda of the Makati regional trial court, acted favorably when, as the expert witness in a hearing, I cited the “Declaration of Lisbon on the Rights of the Patient” adopted by the 34th World Medical Assembly. As PMA president, I was once a delegate to such an assembly. During such gatherings, health policies are discussed and the World Medical Association obliges all member-national medical associations of the civilized world to implement the policies.

Among the declaration’s provisions on Patient Autonomy is the patient’s absolute right to choose where and how to be treated for health conditions and by whom. Included is the stern admonition: Whenever legislation or government action denies these rights of the patient, physicians should seek by appropriate means to assure or to restore them. So far courts of the civilized countries have obliged.

It is hoped more and more of our courts, government authorities and politicians will consider the provisions of the Declaration of Lisbon on the Rights of the Patient—as their counterparts all over the world do.

—DR. SANTIAGO A. DEL ROSARIO,

chair, Commission on Ethics,

Philippine Medical Association