U.S. News: Science calls at the deathbed(1/12/04).

The January 12 issue of U.S. News and World Report has a compelling article about human research conducted on "the nearly dead." The article contrasts research on University of Pittsburgh patients who have already been declared dead according to neurological criteria ("brain dead") but not yet taken off the respirator and research on terminally ill patients at M.D. Anderson who are expected to die soon after life-support is removed. The risk-to-benefit ratio for a dead patient is, of course, extremely low (pretty close to 0/0). The same is almost true of patients as to whom the decision has been made to withdraw life-sustaining treatment and allow the patient to die, but the risk is not zero:

"You can harm living people in ways that you can't harm dead people," says [Pittsburgh ethics panel member Michael] Wicclair. For example, what if the doctors are wrong and the person doesn't die after withdrawal of the machines?

Rebecca Pentz, formerly at M.D. Anderson and now at Emory, is organizing a conference on the topic for Spring 2004. Should be a lively event.