CRITCON-Pandemic Levels - a stepwise ethical approach to clinician
responsibility
- Dan Harvey,
- Andrew McGee,
- Thea DeBeer,
- David Shaw,
- Dale Gardiner
Abstract
CRITCON-Pandemic Levels with an associated Operational Responsibility
Matrix were recently published by the Intensive Care Society as a
modification to Winter Flu CRITCON levels, to better account for
differences between a winter flu surge in critical
care activity and the capacity challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic1. In
this paper we propose an expansion and explanation of the Operational
Matrix to suggest a stepwise ethical approach to clinician
responsibility. We propose and outline the main ethical risks
created at each level and discuss how those risks can be mitigated
through a balanced application of the predominant ethical principle
which in turn provides practical guidance to clinician responsibility.
We thus seek to specify the ethical and legal principles that should be
used in applying the Operational Matrix, and what the practical effects
could be.