Doctors' understanding of consent law

BACKGROUND: Obtaining informed consent is an important responsibility of all doctors and is a major component of their day-to-day practice. However, little is known regarding practising doctors' understanding of consent in relation to medical law. AIMS: To gain insights into current doctors' understanding of the legal requisites that underpin the consent of patients to medical procedures in Australia. METHODS: A cross-sectional survey of Western Australian medical practitioners was conducted. A 15-question online questionnaire (SurveyMonkey, USA) was developed and distributed to Western Australia medical practitioners via social media, hospital-based Junior doctor society pages and through the email accounts of practitioners registered with MDA National - a large medical defence organisation. Doctors were questioned on their understanding of medicolegal responsibilities, informed consent practice and knowledge of a historically significant Australian medicolegal case (Rogers v Whitaker, 1992). RESULTS: A total of 172 responses was received during the survey period. The respondents came from various levels of seniority and from a variety of subspecialist areas. The survey demonstrated that among the respondents, the understanding of their medicolegal responsibilities around the issues of informed consent was deficient. Only 31% of respondents were aware that it is a court of law that defines the reasonable standard of care in relation to obtaining informed consent. Less than half of the respondents (48%) were aware of the High Court of Australia's definition by which the standard of reasonable care is defined. CONCLUSION: The results from our survey suggest that there is a requirement to enhance the education of medical practitioners to meet the medicolegal requirements and optimise consent.