Overriding Parents for the Sake of the Child

Bioethics for the People

In this episode, Tyler and Devan talk to Dr. Jessica Turnbull about a difficult case involving an infant with a severe brain injury. What do we do when a child’s parents make choices the health care team believes are not in the child’s best interest? When should we refuse to continue medical treatments? Who do we turn to when parents are suspected of child abuse?

Jessica Turnbull, M.D., M.A. is a Pediatric Intensivist and a Pediatric Clinical Bioethics at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Her areas of interest include utilizing qualitative research methods to study decision-making for medically complex children during times of critical illness, as well as improving palliative care delivery in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit. She joined the faculty at Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt and the Center for Biomedical Ethics and Society in 2013.