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When conducting clinical trials in intensive care and emergency medicine, physicians, ethics committees, and legal experts have differing views regarding the inclusion of patients who are incapable of giving consent. These different views on the participation of patients who are not capable of giving consent also complicate how clinical trials are prepared and conducted. Based on the results of a literature search, a consensus model (Cologne Model) was developed by physicians performing clinical research, ethics committees, and lawyers in order to provide patients, those scientifically responsible for the study, ethics committees, and probate (guardianship) judges with a maximum of patient safety and legal certainty, while simultaneously enabling scientific research., (© 2023. The Author(s).)

This paper presents the initial results of an anonymous pilot quantitative survey on Muslims' conception of marriage and divorce, which was conducted in Germany between February and June 2018. The goal of the survey was to assess the attitudes held by Muslims towards these issues. Specifically, the questions aimed at identifying the potential role of the European context in the modification of German Muslims' understanding of marriage and divorce and gender roles, as well as interreligious marriage, mediation, and the role of the secular state in daily life. The results of this survey, although not representative of all Muslim perspectives on secular law, indicate dialogic exchange between Islamic and Western secular conceptions of family law. Contrary to some current assumptions concerning Islamic family law in Europe, the survey shows that there are many Muslims who are in favour of both conceptions (the religious and the secular) and wish to find a balance between them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The Guardianship Law became effective in the year 1992 with the intention of replacing the paternalistic-restrictive model by a model based on the principles of participation and empowerment. Methods: Data from the Federal Ministry of Justice were used to examine the development of 12 legal guardianship parameters over a period of 17 years (1992-2009) at the level of federal states. Due to the completely different practise in both parts of Germany before reunification, the development will be analysed separately for the old and the new federal states. Results: All examined parameters indicate an increase of legal guardianship. The highest increases were found for enlargement of the task scope (+606%) and for approval of contention measures (+868%). With the exception of involuntary commitment rates, in the new federal states the mean values of all variables score higher than in the old federal states. Legal guardianship installation only increased for the old federal states significantly (T(9)=6.64; p=0.007); however, the guardianship expenses were higher, but not significantly, for the new federal states. Discussion: In spite of the legal changes in the direction of a dynamic instrument in mental health care, the practise of the Legal Guardianship Law indicates a continuous increase of guardianship orders since 1992. It is necessary to recognise that a slowdown of the upward trend is not in sight. Therefore it is pertinent to call those persons in charge of regulating legal guardianship to consider their daily practise carefully. On the other hand it is a task of mental health services research to analyse the driving factors of the presented developments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]