Expounding on Shared Decision Making in Pediatrics

Although the term “shared decision making” would not be officially coined until the 1983 President’s Commission report on Deciding to Forego Life-Sustaining Treatment,[1] the concept was described 10 years earlier by Duff and Campbell in their highly controversial 1973 publication in the New England Journal of Medicine.[2] In discussing 299 consecutive deaths that occurring in a special-care nursery (what is now known as a neonatal intensive care unit [NICU]), Duff and Campbell spoke the unspeakable by acknowledging that 43 (14 per cent) of the deaths were related to withholding treatment: “After careful consideration of each of these 43 infants, parents and physicians in a group decision concluded that prognosis for meaningful life was extremely poor or hopeless, and therefore rejected further treatment.”[2 at p.

source https://www.jpeds.com/article/S0022-3476(22)00820-4/fulltext?rss=yes