[Comment] Contracts with patients in clinical practice
Source: The Lancet
Written documents called contracts are increasingly present in clinical practice and medical publications. There are behavioural contracts for management of so-called difficult patients, opioid contracts, suicide prevention contracts, and healthy living contracts. Some practices have even asked patients to sign contracts in which they promise not to litigate or post defamatory comments on the internet. Despite widespread adoption, the use of contracts in medicine has had little critical appraisal.