Poll: Should doctors be compensated for responding to in-flight medical emergencies?

I don’t think airlines should have to pay for a patient’s medical treatment in the air. I think you should be speaking to the insurance companies about payment to the doctor. If patients can be covered nationally instead of by state, their insurance should treat such an event like an emergency. If a patient travels out of the country frequently, there should be an option in the insurance policy for global travel. Consider the cost savings if we remove state boundaries thereby creating much needed competition.

I think the patient should have to compensate the doctor; they are the ones receiving the service. I also thing that an airline that requests a travelling professional who is a paying professional to perform services aboard the airline’s aircraft should also compensate the doctor. Emergencies are emergencies, but asking for professional help to assist is definitely different and carries with that request different expectations than a layman passerby or passenger giving basic assistance. There may be a moral obligation to provide professional assistance, resources notwithstanding, but there is not a moral obligation to be expected to do that for free. The airline is charging for their conveyance.

I do not think they should be compensated. It would be the same scenario if a doctor helped an old lady that just had a heart attack at wallmart! Should walmart give the doctor money for being a good Samaritan..

Anon 9:51:

You are confusing several things:

Wanting to be of assistance does not necessarily mean wanting to assist out of a desire for compensation.

Asking for help and asking for a specific kind and quality of help, here professional medical help, are not the same things. The latter carries extra expectations.

Having a moral obligation to render help does not necessarily preclude an expectation to be compensated for rendering that help. And just because there is a moral onus not to withhold the assistance, that doesn’t translate into the expected service also being uncompensated. That really is a non sequitur.

It can be the morally right thing for the qualified medical professional to render assistance to a person in distress, and for true emergencies where time is of the essence, payment considerations should wait until the patient is stabilized. But just because there is an emergency does not nullify any obligation the person receiving the help should have in compensating the person who renders the help, understanding that professional help is what is being solicited and provided. Emergency does not mean free of charge. And expecting fair compensation once the dust settles is not being greedy. In fact, it is a necessary component for moral justice.

Most doctors want to just help, and do not expect compensation. That is part of giving back a little for the very privileged life of the doctor.

In a very old contracts case, an unconscious woman was sent a bill by a surgeon who came upon her after her car accident. She refused to pay because she had not asked to be helped, and had not formed a patient/doctor relationship, nor accepted any contractual relationship. The court said, she would be unjustly enriched by his services if she did not pay, and awarded the doctor the fee (in a contract at law or quantum meruit).

The doctor who tends to a distressed patient on aplance should accept no payment whatsoever. Say, thank you to a glass of diet coke in payment for your help, and you just waived the immunity in the Good Samaritan law.

this gets at the heart of why we became doctors in the first place, doesn’t it? i for one would like to jump in and help someone in their time of need, but wish there were stronger good samaritan laws that would keep all but the most grossly negligent cases out of court.

if someone has a bad outcome because of the lack of resources or something bad happening at the receiving hospital after the plane makes its emergency landing and i wind up twisting in the wind for years, making multiple trips to some faraway city on my own dime and missing work to do so before my name is finally dropped, i am not adequately protected by good sam.

every time there is a story about someone getting sued under these circumstances, regardless of the outcome, i am just a little less likely to raise my hand when that call goes overhead.

Most civilized people would drive a total stranger to the hospital in an emergency situation without expecting an ambulance fee. Those who know CPR would readily perform it without demanding payment. It is sad there are some doctors who apparently can’t be expected to do anything even in an emergency situation unless there is something in it for them, but this highlights the essential nature of our medical system which is geared 100 percent to the pursuit of profit and the self-interest of physicians and rarely concerns itself with what is moral or correct.

Paynehertz:

Your analogy doesn’t really fit. Many people might drive a person to the hospital. That doesn’t make them ambulance drivers or paramedics. But if you flag down an ambulance and request that the paramedic or EMT take you to the hospital, that really is not the same thing as asking a layman who might use a private vehicle. The ambulance is a specialized piece of rescue equipment and its crew and driver, a trained professional team. Whether you want to admit it or not, when you flag them down, you are expecting something different than you would from a taxi.

The same is true if you say “is there a doctor in the house?” versus “can anyone help me, anyone, . . .Bueller?.” That really isn’t too hard to understand. When you ask if there is a doctor, you do so with expectations of getting help from someone who is a professional, not just anyone.

CPR is meant to be administered by anyone trained to do it. Knowing CPR and administering it does not make you a professional, doctor, nurse, paramedic or EMT. Doing CPR doesn’t imply professional help was available, even though it may have been, even if CPR was all even a physician might be able to do, given a situation where there were no other resources. So no, someone giving CPR shouldn’t expect to be paid, if that is all they were doing and were not bringing any professional knowledge to the situation.

Paynehertz, you wrote:”It is sad there are some doctors who apparently can’t be expected to do anything even in an emergency situation unless there is something in it for them, but this highlights the essential nature of our medical system which is geared 100 percent to the pursuit of profit and the self-interest of physicians and rarely concerns itself with what is moral or correct.”

I don’t see anywhere where anyone wrote that they would withhold help unless they were paid. You seem to be the only person saying that, obviously it seems for the purpose of taking a poke at doctors, something you seem to like to do. And where is your proof of medicine being “100% in the pursuit of profit?” Easy slur, cranks say that kind of stuff, but just plain untrue.

What if you are a radiologist or a pathologist who hasn’t seen a patient for 20 years? Do you want me to take care of your loved one?

Asa general proposition:Good Samaritan rules don’t apply for professionals. Professionals acting in the area of their avocation are held to a higher standard.

I woudn’t expect to be compensated under this circumstance, anymore then I would for helping a stranger on the street stand back up after they’d just tripped and fallen.