RT Article
T1 Smuggled Doughnuts and Forbidden Fried Chicken: Addressing Tensions around Family and Food Restrictions in Hospitals
JF The Hastings Center report
VO 53
IS 4
SP 10
OP 15
A1 Dean, Megan A.
A1 Guidry-Grimes, Laura K. ca. 20./21. Jh.
LA English
PB Wiley
YR 2023
UL https://ixtheo.de/Record/1854864211
AB It is a common practice for family members to bring food to hospitalized loved ones. However, in some cases, this food contravenes a patient's dietary plan. Such situations can create significant tension and distrust between health care professionals and families and may lead the former to doubt a family's willingness or ability to support patient recovery. This case-study essay offers an ethical analysis of these situations. We draw on Hilde Lindemann's work to argue that providing food to family members is an important way that families discharge their moral functions of caring for their members and holding them in their identities. When family members are hospitalized, other means of performing these functions are limited. Acknowledging the ethical importance of feeding family members alongside the medical need for dietary restrictions, we offer strategies for creative problem-solving that center diet as a subject for shared decision-making and regular, ongoing communication among health care professionals, patients, and families.
K1 doctor–patient family relationship
K1 shared decision-making
K1 Eating
K1 Food
K1 Family
K1 clinical ethics
K1 dietary restrictions
DO 10.1002/hast.1496