Bernard Lo, M.D. Professor of Medicine Director, Program in Medical Ethics

Education and Training

• Medical School: Stanford University
• Residency: University of California, Los Angeles, Stanford University
• Fellowship: Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholars Program, Stanford University

Affiliations

Director, Ethics Core, Center for AIDS Prevention Studies

Areas Of Interest

• Decisions about life-sustaining treatment
• Ethical dilemmas regarding AIDS
• Ethical issues in managed care
• Confidentiality of computerized medical records
• Impact of the internet and direct-to-consumer advertising on the doctor-patient relationship

Current Academic and/or Research Activities

Dr. Lo's general research area is clinical medical ethics. Specific interests include: end-of-life care, particularly talking to patients about palliative care, attention to spiritual aspects of care, physician-assisted suicide; the doctor-patient relationship, particularly the impact of the Internet and alternative and complementary medicine; and ethical issues regarding HIV infection, particularly prevention of perinatal infection and conduct of HIV vaccine trials.

Recent Publications

Alpers A, Lo B. When is CPR futile? JAMA 1995; 273: 156-8.

Lo B. AIDS: health care and research issues. In Reich, W. Encyclopedia of Bioethics. New York: Simon & Shuster Macmillan; 1995: 113-120.

Ziv TA, Lo B. Denial of care to illegal immigrants: Proposition 187 in California. N Engl J Med 1995; 332: 1095-1098.

Hyman A, Schillinger D, Lo B. Laws mandating reporting of domestic violence: do they promote patient well being? JAMA 1995; 273: 1781-1787.

Asai A, Fukahara S, Lo B. Physician attitudes towards life-sustaining interventions in Japan and America. Lancet, 1995; 346: 356-359.

Alpers A, Lo B. Physician-assisted suicide in Oregon: a bold experiment. JAMA 1995; 274: 483-487.

Tulsky JA, Chesney MA, Lo B. How do medical residents discuss resuscitation with patients? J Gen Intern Med 1995; 10: 436-442.

Lo B. Why is it so hard to improve care at the end of life? JAMA 1995 274; 1634-1636..

Tulsky JA, Chesney MA, Lo B. "See one, do one, teach one?" Housestaff experience discussing do-not-resuscitate orders. Arch Intern Med 1996; 156:1285-9.

Alpers A, Lo B. Does it make clinical sense to equate terminally ill patients who require life-sustaining interventions with those who do not? JAMA 1997; 277: 1705-1708.

Quill TG, Lo B, Brock DW. Palliative options of last resort: a comparison of voluntarily stopping eating and drinking, terminal sedation, physician-assisted suicide, and voluntary active euthanasia. JAMA 1997; 278: 2099-2104.

Oscherwitz T, Tulsky JP, Roger S, Scortino S, Alpers A, Royce S, Lo B. Detention of persistently nonadherent tuberculosis patients. JAMA 1997; 278: 843-846.

Gallagher TH, Lo B, Chesney M, Christiansen K. How do managed care physicians respond to patients' requests for costly, unindicated tests? J Gen Intern Med 1997; 12: 663-668.

Lo B. Ethical decisions in clinical medicine. In: Fauci AS, Braunwald E, Isselbacher KJ, etc. ed. Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine. (14th ed.) McGraw Hill, 1998: 6-8.

Kim N, Lo B, Gates EA. Disclosing the role of residents and medical students in hysterectomy: what do patients want? Acad Med 1998; 73: 339-341.

Lurie P, Miller S, Hecht F, Chesney M, Lo B. Post-exposure prophylaxis after non-occupational exposure to HIV: clinical, ethical, and policy considerations. JAMA 1998; 280: 1769-1773.

Alpers A, Lo B. The Supreme Court addresses physician-assisted suicide: can its decisions improve palliative care? Arch Fam Pract 1999; 8: 200-205.

Lo B, Sox H, Snyder L. Care at the end of life: guiding practice where there are no easy answers. Ann Intern Med 1999; 130: 772-774.

Lo B, Quill T, Tulsky J. Discussing palliative care with patients. Ann Intern Med 1999; 130: 744-749.

Lo, B. The patient-provider relationship: opportunities as well as problems. J Gen Intern Med 1999; 14 Suppl 1: S41-44.

Bodenheimer T, Lo B, Casalino L. Primary care physicians should be coordinators, not gatekeepers. JAMA 1999; 281: 2045-2049.

Levinison W, Dudeck R, Egener B, et al. Resolving disagreements in the patient-physician relationship: tools for improving communication in managed care. JAMA 1999; 282: 1477-1483.

Health Privacy Working Group. Best Principles for Health Privacy. Washington, D.C.: Institute for Health Care Research and Policy, Georgetown University, 1999.

Lo, B. Resolving Ethical Dilemmas: A Guide for Clinicians. 2nd Ed. Lippincott Williams &Wilkins, In press, 2000.