Alexia Torke, MD, MS, will present “The Challenges of Surrogate Decision Making in the Hospital” on Wednesday, May 14 at 11:30 AM in the Methodist Hospital Petticrew Auditorium. The lecture is sponsored by the Charles Warren Fairbanks Center for Medical Ethics. Dr. Torke will describe research evidence and theories that challenge the standard model for making medical decisions for adults who lack decision making capacity. She will describe a new model based on consensus and respect for persons.
Dr. Torke is Associate Director of the Fairbanks Fellowship in Clinical Ethics, an Assistant Professor of Medicine in the Department of General Medicine and Geriatrics, Indiana University School of Medicine, and Research Scientist with the Indiana University Center for Aging Research and the Regenstrief Institute. Dr. Torke’s research investigates ethical aspects of medical decision making for older adults and end-of-life decision making for hospitalized adults. Her current work focuses on the processes by which physicians, family members and others make decisions for older patients with dementia and other forms of cognitive impairment. Her research has been published in Archives of Internal Medicine, the Journal of General Internal Medicine and the Journal of Clinical Ethics.
Lectures in the Fairbanks Ethics Series are free, open to all, and do not require pre-registration. Continuing education credit is offered to physicians, nurses, social workers, and chaplains at no charge. Lunch will not be provided but you may “brown bag” your lunch and eat during the presentation.