Amanda Mitchell

11/24/14
Code of Ethics

Medical Code of Ethics:

DUTIES OF PHYSICIANS IN GENERAL
A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

always exercise his/her independent professional judgment and

maintain the highest standards of professional conduct.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

respect a competent patient's right to accept or refuse treatment.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

not allow his/her judgment to be influenced by personal profit or

unfair discrimination.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

be dedicated to providing competent medical service in full

professional and moral independence, with compassion and respect
for human dignity.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

deal honestly with patients and colleagues, and report to the

appropriate authorities those physicians who practice unethically or
incompetently or who engage in fraud or deception.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

not receive any financial benefits or other incentives solely for

referring patients or prescribing specific products.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

respect the rights and preferences of patients, colleagues, and

other health professionals.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

recognize his/her important role in educating the public but should

use due caution in divulging discoveries or new techniques or
treatment through non-professional channels.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

certify only that which he/she has personally verified.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

strive to use health care resources in the best way to benefit

patients and their community.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

seek appropriate care and attention if he/she suffers from mental or

physical illness.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

respect the local and national codes of ethics.

DUTIES OF PHYSICIANS TO PATIENTS

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

always bear in mind the obligation to respect human life.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

act in the patient's best interest when providing medical care.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

owe his/her patients complete loyalty and all the scientific

resources available to him/her. Whenever an examination or
treatment is beyond the physician's capacity, he/she should
consult with or refer to another physician who has the necessary
ability.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

respect a patient's right to confidentiality. It is ethical to disclose

confidential information when the patient consents to it or when
there is a real and imminent threat of harm to the patient or to
others and this threat can be only removed by a breach of
confidentiality.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

give emergency care as a humanitarian duty unless he/she is

assured that others are willing and able to give such care.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

in situations when he/she is acting for a third party, ensure that

the patient has full knowledge of that situation.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

not enter into a sexual relationship with his/her current patient or

into any other abusive or exploitative relationship.

DUTIES OF PHYSICIANS TO COLLEAGUES

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

behave towards colleagues as he/she would have them behave

towards him/her.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

NOT undermine the patient-physician relationship of colleagues in

order to attract patients.

A PHYSICIAN
SHALL

when medically necessary, communicate with colleagues who are

involved in the care of the same patient. This communication
should respect patient confidentiality and be confined to

necessary information.

http://www.wma.net/en/30publications/10policies/c8/

MILWAUKEE (WITI) Smoking pot with patients prescribing dangerous amounts of

prescription drugs even treating underage girls without their parents consent.
Those are the accusations which landed local psychiatrist Dr. Ron Rubin in hot water earlier this
year.
Now his medical license has been suspended indefinitely, and hes defending himself in an
exclusive interview with FOX6 Investigator Meghan Dwyer.
I didnt steal money, I didnt sleep with any patients, I didnt act unethically, he says. I signed
an agreement so I could get back to work.
Debra Wilcox blames Dr. Rubin for problems shes had with her teenage daughter. She says Dr.
Rubin gave her child psychiatric care without her consent.
I had a messed up daughter after this, Wilcox says.
Wilcox claims Dr. Rubin got her teenage daughter hooked on Adderall, a potent amphetamine
prescribed for Attention Deficit Disorder. Her prescription was for 90 milligrams a day, more
than twice the maximum recommended dose for an adult yet she was just 15.
He would take my daughters prescription and take pills out for his own use. Hes the one who
got my daughter hooked on pot, Wilcox says.
Thats not true, Rubin says.
When we asked the doctor if he ever smoked pot with patients in his basement, he said hes
never smoked pot with a patient, and he never would.
Never, ever, ever, Rubin says.
According to complaints filed with the Wisconsin Medical Examining Board Dr. Rubin overprescribed stimulants to at least nine patients last year, many of them people he met at Wisconsin
strip clubs.
Were these strippers? Were you handing out amphetamines like candy to strippers?

No, no, not at all, Rubin says.

Dr. Rubin says he considers a recommended dosage as just that a recommendation.
I had hundreds of patients taking these medicines. If there were only 9 that were outside that
range, Id actually be surprised, he says.
I was not prescribing dangerous amounts.
State investigators say the pills werent just for Dr. Rubins patients. Sometimes he took a cut for
himself a claim Dr. Rubin says is outrageous.
When I prescribe something to somebody, and it neither works or somebody else prescribes
something that doesnt work, they dont want it sitting around a house with 6 kids, Rubin says.
So he says he took the medicines back from his patients, tore off the labels, and put them in his
desk drawers, planning to eventually dispose of them.
Ive found in 30 years I dont know of a place where Ive worked alongside other physicians
who didnt do exactly the same, Rubin says.
But according to the Medical Examining Board, its against the states medical rules. And so was
the other activity Dr. Rubin stands accused of: failing to maintain patient health care records,
over-prescribing amphetamines, and prescribing controlled substances to family members.
You can imagine the cases that get our attention, this was one of them. This was significant
enough that it got our attention, says Dr. Kenneth Simons, Chair of the Medical Examining
Board.
He says its not the Boards job to punish doctors, but it is the Boards job to protect the public.
If we had just limited him or suspended him for a year or two years, he could crawl under the
proverbial rock, complete the terms and then he gets to come back. Now has to ask us for
permission, Dr. Simons says.
Im confused. I dont get it. I really dont know what I did to deserve this, to have 30 years of
practice without any significant incident, Rubin says.
But there was a significant incident back in 1996.
I think its awful particularly because I did attempt to take his, get his license from him, says
Tammy, a former patient.
Tammy met Dr. Rubin a year after he got his medical license.
He said before I got my prescriptions, that we had to go to the bedroom, Tammy says.

In a malpractice lawsuit she filed against him in 1998, she claimed Dr. Rubin sexually exploited
her.
We dated for awhile, Rubin says. And he also admits writing her prescriptions.
But as for the sex, he says its kind of like Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky.
There was issue with what constitutes sex, Rubin says. While we may not have had
intercourse, you may call it sexual contact.
Tammy lost her case in court, and the Medical Examining Board never punished Dr. Rubin for
having sexual contact with a patient.
Eleven complaints have been filed against Dr. Rubin since 1997. But this is the first time the
Medical Examining Board has taken any formal disciplinary action.
I dont understand why they came down like a ton of bricks on me. Im confused about that,
truly, Rubin says.
Dr. Rubin can possibly practice medicine again. If he follows the Boards order, he can ask the
Medical Examining Board for permission to get his license back. The details of his discipline are
available here.

Essay
The code of ethics I am using is from the World Medical Association, and it is used
internationally. This code of ethics was originally created in 1949, and has been amended 3 times
since then. This code of ethics is relevant to my future career because I want to work in the
medical field as a pathologist. Pathologists are doctor who examine tissues and analyze lab
samples in order to figure out the best way to treat a patient, as well as diagnose patients. One
strength of this code of ethics is that it is very thorough and covers almost all aspects of medicine
in which ethical issues could possibly arise. A weakness of this code of ethics is that it is very
lengthy and redundant. Something I saw in this code of ethics that I didnt expect was that it
mentions that medical professionals have a moral obligation to care for those in need of medical
attention. One line of the code of ethics reads a physician shall give emergency care as a
humanitarian duty unless he/she is assured that others are willing and able to give such care.
While some of the theorists in our textbook discuss the idea that we dont have a moral
obligation to help others, the medical community seems to have a much different view on this
concept.
The news story I have discovered is about a doctor named Ron Rubin who is currently
being investigated for medical malpractice after a slew of accusations from multiple different
patients. He has been accused of smoking pot with patients, over-prescribing stimulants, taking
cuts of patients prescriptions for himself, and sexually exploiting his patients. He denies the pot
accusation, and claims that the others were all just misunderstandings between him and his
patients. Obviously, there are quite a few potential ethical issues here, so I have just listed the
relevant parts of the code of ethics below.
A physician shall:

always exercise his/her independent professional judgment and maintain the

highest standards of professional conduct.
be dedicated to providing competent medical service in full professional and
moral independence, with compassion and respect for human dignity.
not receive any financial benefits or other incentives solely for referring patients
or prescribing specific products.
act in the patient's best interest when providing medical care.
not enter into a sexual relationship with his/her current patient or into any other
abusive or exploitative relationship.

If I had to summarize these into a main ethical problem, I would say that the main ethical
issue is that Dr. Rubin is exploiting the power that he has as a doctor. The code of ethics
definitely addresses this ethical issue sufficiently, because this problem is the reason it had to be
developed in the first place. Medical professional possess a certain degree of power. They are
respected and regarded as highly intelligent and trustworthy individuals. They also have access
to and the ability to prescribe drugs with little restrictions. It is important that doctors use their
power in good and ethical ways for the sake of the safety and health of their patients. When a
doctor asks a patient to do something, the patient usually does it because they trust their doctor
and understands that they probably know more than they do about whatever they are seeking
treatment for. When doctors exploit their power and their patients, several ethical issues can
arise. This is why the medical community has countless codes of ethics. This code of ethics is
very thorough and adequately addresses the ethical issue of abusing ones power as a medical
professional.
This code of ethics would be very helpful to me if I were to become a doctor. I think there
are a lot of gray areas in medicine where there isnt necessarily a right or wrong way to do
something, and that this code of ethics would be a good tool to use in order to insure that those
gray areas are addressed in an ethical manner. I think its a good example of rule utilitarianism
because if everyone were to follow these rules, it would produce a lot of good.