Informed Consent in Podiatry: Legislation, concept and structur

Abstract

Informed Consent has evolved a lot in the recent years despite it was not really accepted at the beginnig by health professionals. From legislative point of view this development has gone through Health General Law (14/1986) where it was already said that it is compulsory to reply the Informed Consent and, on the other hand, the recent Patient Autonomy Law (41/2002) that speaks about what it is use for, who must receive it… and many other concepts. With this law it has been possible to change the relationship between health professionals and patients: It is more important to respect the autonomy of the patient over the paternalistic principle based on “the search for the best for the patient”. At this article, we have reviewed and studied general legislation, as well as its advantages and disadvantages.