Ethical and legal issues in family practice.

The unique goal of family practice, that of caring for the entire family's broadly defined health needs, places the family physician in an especially uncomfortable position when there is intrafamily conflict. In particular, the question of "whose agent (physician) are you?" when a family is in conflict often creates a serious ethical dilemma for the family physician. The roles of three experts who deal with family conflict, the psychotherapist, the lawyer, and the family physician, are compared and contrasted. The physician as expert is a useful approach only insofar as there are clearcut answers to a particular problem. But the ambiguity inherent in ethical problems makes this approach less than satisfactory. The role of the physician as teacher/facilitator is explored as an alternative to resolving the ethical dilemmas of intrafamily conflict.