Causation is an issue that is fundamental in both law and medicine, as well as the interface between the two disciplines. It is vital for the resolution of a great many disputes in court concerning personal injuries, medical negligence, criminal law and coronial issues, as well as in the provision of both diagnoses and treatment in medicine. This book offers a vital analysis of issues such as causation in law and medicine, issues of causal responsibility, agency and harm in criminal law, causation in forensic medicine, scientific and statistical approaches to causation, proof of cause, influence and effect, and causal responsibility in tort law. Including contributions from a number of distinguished doctors, lawyers and scientists, it will be of great interest and value to academics and practitioners alike.
This book undertakes an analysis of academic and judicial responses to the problem of evidential uncertainty in causation in negligence. It seeks to bring clarity to what has become a notoriously complex area by adopting a clear approach to the function of the doctrine of causation within a corrective justice-based account of negligence liability. It first explores basic causal models and issues of proof, including the role of statistical and epidemiological evidence, in order to isolate the problem of evidential uncertainty more precisely. Application of Richard Wright's NESS test to a range of English case law shows it to be more comprehensive than the 'but for' test that currently dominates, thereby reducing the need to resort to additional tests, such as the Wardlaw test of material contribution to harm, the scope and meaning of which are uncertain. The book builds on this foundation to explore the solution to a range of problems of evidential uncertainty, focusing on the Fairchild principle and the idea of risk as damage, as well as the notion of loss of a chance in medical negligence which is often seen as analogous with 'increase in risk', in an attempt to bring coherence to this area of the law.
The only comprehensive tort law book featuring real-life federal cases for the practicing pharmacist As tort law and tort liability cases, both civil and administrative, continue to increase in the pharmacy practice, now more than ever, it is imperative for students and practitioners to understand the civil liability a pharmacist may face. Between intentional torts, negligence, vicarious liability, defamation, invasion of privacy, and more, practitioners and practitioners-to-be need to grasp the intricacies of the law in this landscape of increased litigation. Pharmacy Practice and Tort Law introduces students not only to the civil action cases related to pharmacy practice, but also provides explanation on how tort rules apply to the facts of a given case. Each type of civil action is described in detail, outlining the elements that must be proven for successful litigation, followed by detailed explanation of actual federal cases and their outcomes, illustrating how a case can be successful or unsuccessful.
This book presents a logical system of critical appraisal, to allow readers to evaluate studies and to carry out their own studies more effectively. This system emphasizes the central importance of cause and effect relationships. Its great strength is that it is applicable to a wide range of issues, and both to intervention trials and observational studies. This system unifies the often different approaches used in epidemiology, health services research, clinical trials, and evidence-based medicine, starting from a logical consideration of cause and effect. The author's approach to the issues of study design, selection of subjects, bias, confounding, and the place of statistical methods has been praised for its clarity and interest. Systematic reviews, meta-analysis, and the applications of this logic to evidence-based medicine, knowledge-based health care, and health practice and policy are discussed. Current and often controversial examples are used, including screening for prostate cancer, publication bias in psychiatry, public health issues in developing countries, and conflicts between observational studies and randomized trials. Statistical issues are explained clearly without complex mathematics, and the most useful methods are summarized in the appendix. The final chapters give six applications of the critical appraisal of major studies: randomized trials of medical treatment and prevention, a prospective and a retrospective cohort study, a small matched case-control study, and a large case-control study. In these chapters, sections of the original papers are reproduced and the original studies placed in context by a summary of current developments.
The Oxford Handbook of Criminal Law reflects the continued transformation of criminal law into a global discipline, providing scholars with a comprehensive international resource, a common point of entry into cutting edge contemporary research and a snapshot of the state and scope of the field. To this end, the Handbook takes a broad approach to its subject matter, disciplinarily, geographically, and systematically. Its contributors include current and future research leaders representing a variety of legal systems, methodologies, areas of expertise, and research agendas. The Handbook is divided into four parts: Approaches & Methods (I), Systems & Methods (II), Aspects & Issues (III), and Contexts & Comparisons (IV). Part I includes essays exploring various methodological approaches to criminal law (such as criminology, feminist studies, and history). Part II provides an overview of systems or models of criminal law, laying the foundation for further inquiry into specific conceptions of criminal law as well as for comparative analysis (such as Islamic, Marxist, and military law). Part III covers the three aspects of the penal process: the definition of norms and principles of liability (substantive criminal law), along with a less detailed treatment of the imposition of norms (criminal procedure) and the infliction of sanctions (prison law). Contributors consider the basic topics traditionally addressed in scholarship on the general and special parts of the substantive criminal law (such as jurisdiction, mens rea, justifications, and excuses). Part IV places criminal law in context, both domestically and transnationally, by exploring the contrasts between criminal law and other species of law and state power and by investigating criminal law's place in the projects of comparative law, transnational, and international law.
The concept of causation is fundamental to ascribing moral and legal responsibility for events. Yet the relationship between causation and responsibility remains unclear. What precisely is the connection between the concept of causation used in attributing responsibility and the accounts of causal relations offered in the philosophy of science and metaphysics? How much of what we call causal responsibility is in truth defined by non-causal factors? This book argues that much of thelegal doctrine on these questions is confused and incoherent, and offers the first comprehensive attempt since Hart and Honoré to clarify the philosophical background to the legal and moral debates.The book first sets out the place of causation in criminal and tort law and outlines the metaphysics presupposed by the legal doctrine. It then analyses the best theoretical accounts of causation in the philosophy of science and metaphysics, and using these accounts criticises many of the core legal concepts surrounding causation - such as intervening causation, forseeability of harm and complicity. It considers and rejects the radical proposals to eliminate the notion of causation from law byusing risk analysis to attribute responsibility. The result of the analysis is a powerful argument for revising our understanding of the role played by causation in the attribution of legal and moral responsibility.
Why is understanding causation so important in philosophy and the sciences? Should causation be defined in terms of probability? Whilst causation plays a major role in theories and concepts of medicine, little attempt has been made to connect causation and probability with medicine itself. Causality, Probability, and Medicine is one of the first books to apply philosophical reasoning about causality to important topics and debates in medicine. Donald Gillies provides a thorough introduction to and assessment of competing theories of causality in philosophy, including action-related theories, causality and mechanisms, and causality and probability. Throughout the book he applies them to important discoveries and theories within medicine, such as germ theory; tuberculosis and cholera; smoking and heart disease; the first ever randomized controlled trial designed to test the treatment of tuberculosis; the growing area of philosophy of evidence-based medicine; and philosophy of epidemiology. This book will be of great interest to students and researchers in philosophy of science and philosophy of medicine, as well as those working in medicine, nursing and related health disciplines where a working knowledge of causality and probability is required.
Getting the right diagnosis is a key aspect of health care - it provides an explanation of a patient's health problem and informs subsequent health care decisions. The diagnostic process is a complex, collaborative activity that involves clinical reasoning and information gathering to determine a patient's health problem. According to Improving Diagnosis in Health Care, diagnostic errors-inaccurate or delayed diagnoses-persist throughout all settings of care and continue to harm an unacceptable number of patients. It is likely that most people will experience at least one diagnostic error in their lifetime, sometimes with devastating consequences. Diagnostic errors may cause harm to patients by preventing or delaying appropriate treatment, providing unnecessary or harmful treatment, or resulting in psychological or financial repercussions. The committee concluded that improving the diagnostic process is not only possible, but also represents a moral, professional, and public health imperative. Improving Diagnosis in Health Care, a continuation of the landmark Institute of Medicine reports To Err Is Human (2000) and Crossing the Quality Chasm (2001), finds that diagnosis-and, in particular, the occurrence of diagnostic errorsâ€"has been largely unappreciated in efforts to improve the quality and safety of health care. Without a dedicated focus on improving diagnosis, diagnostic errors will likely worsen as the delivery of health care and the diagnostic process continue to increase in complexity. Just as the diagnostic process is a collaborative activity, improving diagnosis will require collaboration and a widespread commitment to change among health care professionals, health care organizations, patients and their families, researchers, and policy makers. The recommendations of Improving Diagnosis in Health Care contribute to the growing momentum for change in this crucial area of health care quality and safety.
