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Previous Volume 334:60-61 January 4, 1996 Number 1 Next

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By Lawrence J. Schneiderman and Nancy S. Jecker. 200 pp. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995. $25.95. ISBN 0-8018-5036-3.

About the debate over futility, not a few have commented that the debate itself is futile. We will never establish an objective, uniform definition, so we should not try. Schneiderman and Jecker do not agree with this stance. In their book they issue a clarion call to physicians to take the lead in defining medical futility as a matter of professional duty. Rejecting definitions of futility based on the patient's goals alone, on prolonging noncognitive life, or on treatment that has only a physiologic effect, the authors offer their own definition of medical futility: "any effort to provide a benefit . . . [Full Text of this Article]

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