Respect for autonomy has become the guiding principle at the forefront of health-care decision-making. In an attempt to preserve this principle, patients can be neglected to make decisions for themselves during times when they cannot make fully capable decisions. Under certain circumstances, it is necessary to have others assist a patient in making decisions that may have a significant impact on the patient’s life and, will ultimately, respect the patient's prior expressed capable wishes and values. This thesis aims to provide arguments in favor of both respect for autonomy and medical paternalism under very specific circumstances. It provides traditional, contemporary and psychological arguments in support of respect for autonomy. Several key arguments in favor of medical paternalism are also presented on the grounds of the loss of personal identity, a social insurance policy and the abandonment of vulnerable patients. Furthermore, the difficulties involved in both accounts are also discussed with respect to the idealization of autonomy and the potential abuses involved in medical paternalism. This thesis concludes through drawing upon the notion of an authentic self as applied to this discussion, allowing for a compatible defense of these two traditionally competing theories.

Respect for autonomy has become the guiding principle at the forefront of health-care decision-making. In an attempt to preserve this principle, patients can be neglected to make decisions for themselves during times when they cannot make fully capable decisions. Under certain circumstances, it is necessary to have others assist a patient in making decisions that may have a significant impact on the patient’s life and, will ultimately, respect the patient's prior expressed capable wishes and values. This thesis aims to provide arguments in favor of both respect for autonomy and medical paternalism under very specific circumstances. It provides traditional, contemporary and psychological arguments in support of respect for autonomy. Several key arguments in favor of medical paternalism are also presented on the grounds of the loss of personal identity, a social insurance policy and the abandonment of vulnerable patients. Furthermore, the difficulties involved in both accounts are also discussed with respect to the idealization of autonomy and the potential abuses involved in medical paternalism. This thesis concludes through drawing upon the notion of an authentic self as applied to this discussion, allowing for a compatible defense of these two traditionally competing theories.

AI is entering clinical care and the healthcare sector in a big way, at the same time, a growing number of scholars are concerned that this technology cannot adhere to current bioethical principles. In particular, there are increasing concerns that AI poses a threat to the autonomy of patients by being irreconcilable with the practice of informed consent. In this essay, I shall defend the thesis that some applications of AI can be reconciled with a revised version of informed consent – what I call AI Adapted Informed Consent. This solution shall not rest on the idea of making black box AI more transparent or explicable. Instead, I shall argue that black box AI does not necessarily withhold the kind of information necessary for informed consent. Rather, patients can be given epistemic access to the kind of information necessary to make an informed decision, as well as being informed as to how the AI is used in the medical decision-making and in the assessment of their medical situation. Hence, this solution offers a re-interpretation of informed consent as information about contextual functioning and role of AI in medical decision-making. Drawing on republican interpretations of freedom as nondomination, I argue that demands for informed consent can only be restrained if it preserves the voluntariness of our decisions. Hence, I shall conclude that my adapted informed consent thesis allows for the possibility that some applications of black box AI in clinical care can be reconciled with informed consent and due respect for patient autonomy – if three specific conditions can be met.

Thesis: The main contribution of D. Orem's self-care theory is that, using adequate methods, it leads the nurses to respect patients' own conception of self-care. Key words: Patient - nurse relationships, Self-Care Deficit Nursing Theory, D. E. Orem, human actions, respect for autonomy, NANDA taxonomy, non-compliance, responsibility. This dissertation thesis deals with the issues of a relationship between a patient and a healthcare worker, or more precisely a nurse, all from the point of view of patient self-care in the sense of deliberate action that is conducted by the patient for the purpose of sustaining their health and realizing their life plans. Ethical aspects of Orem's Self-Care Deficit Theory consist in the approach to a person that emphasizes the human nature of a human being that develops within the community - among other people, that becomes unique and that cares about their own being. Self-care deficit nursing theory is compared to NANDA taxonomy II with respect to a patient's autonomy. Both approaches to nursing care are studied from the point of view of their assumptions, theoretical basis, the diagnostic process, communication, personal competence of nurses and the aims of health care. Attention is also paid to the situations when a patient is not willing to take part in the...