Beck J C
Department of Psychiatry, Cambridge Hospital, MA 02139, USA.
Behav Sci Law. 1998 Summer;16(3):375-89. doi: 10.1002/(sici)1099-0798(199822)16:3<375::aid-bsl312>3.0.co;2-j.
This paper reviews published tort cases that arose after a patient impulsively hurt or killed someone. Plaintiffs alleged breach of the duty to protect (Tarasoff) or negligent release from hospital. There are sixteen cases involving a variety of facts and diagnoses. As a matter of law courts typically hold that impulsive violence is not foreseeable. One jury found a defendant negligent but that verdict was ultimately overturned. Statutes on duty to protect do not imply a duty to act on the fact patterns of impulsive violence in this sample. The author concludes that the ethical duty to do careful clinical work is essentially identical to the legal duty to use due care in these cases. The law imposes no additional burden on the clinician in these cases.
本文回顾了患者冲动伤人或杀人后引发的已公布的侵权案件。原告指控存在保护义务（塔拉索夫案）的违反或医院的疏忽性出院行为。有16起案件涉及各种事实和诊断情况。从法律角度看，法院通常认为冲动暴力是不可预见的。一个陪审团判定被告有过失，但该裁决最终被推翻。在本样本中，关于保护义务的法规并未暗示在冲动暴力事实模式下有采取行动的义务。作者得出结论，在这些案例中，进行谨慎临床工作的道德义务与使用合理谨慎的法律义务基本相同。在这些案例中，法律并未给临床医生施加额外负担。
