Informed consent requires disclosure of the nature of the proposed treatment, its material risks, reasonable alternatives, and the consequences of declining. A claim alleges that adequate disclosure was not made and that the patient would have declined had it been.
It is distinct from a negligence claim about how the treatment was performed.
Alternative Names:
Consent to Treatment, Informed Consent Doctrine
Why it Matters?
Informed consent claims often accompany a technical negligence claim and survive even where the procedure was performed competently. The causation element is the practical battleground: the plaintiff must show that a reasonable patient, or in some states this patient, would have declined the procedure with full disclosure. Consent forms help but rarely decide the issue, since the question is what was actually communicated.
Frequently Confused with
Related terms
Frequently asked questions
Does a signed consent form defeat an informed consent claim?
What must the plaintiff prove on causation?
