THE PRACTICABILITY OF PATIENT’S RIGHT TO INFORMATION AND INFORMED CONSENT IN THE NIGERIA MEDICAL SECTOR

Abstract

Patient’s Right to be fully informed on the state of their health condition and the latest developments on health has not been obtainable of late in Nigeria, as most medical practitioners rarely disclose necessary information to their patients. Patients have the right to know their past and present medical status and to be free of any mistaken beliefs concerning their conditions. Medical practitioners are duty-bound to disclose every information about their patient’s state of health. Thus, where the right to information is lacking or where proper information is not given, the patient cannot be seen to be giving informed consent to the treatment. This paper aims to examine the right of the patient to information about his health condition, the practicability in Nigerian hospitals, and the observation of the patient’s right to give informed consent on treatment and procedures available. The doctrinal method of research is applied in the course of this work. This paper shows that though doctors ob tain consent from their patients before surgical operations, the method of obtaining such information is not satisfactory as most of the time, patients end up giving consent to a procedure that they are not well informed about. Aside from surgical operations, one cannot validly say that patients’ consents are gotten before ordinary treatment is given as doctors do not bother themselves with certain explanations and information since what they intend to do is mere treatment and not surgery. Hence, the right to informed consent remains continually breached and the patients or their family members rarely take these cases to court, this has made doctors not realize the need to abide by the principles of informed consent. This paper recommends that physicians disclose every medical detail to the patient so that when the patient is making any consent with regards to the treatment procedure to be given to him, his decision can now qualify as informed consent. It is also recommended that patients begin to utilize our courts in enforcing any breach of their right to informed consent.