Is clinician refusal to treat an emerging problem in injury compensation systems?

Abstract

Objective: The reasons that doctors may refuse or be reluctant to treat have not been widely explored in the medical literature. To understand the ethical implications of reluctance to treat there is a need to recognise the constraints of doctors working in complex systems and to consider how these constraints may influence reluctance. The aim of this paper is to illustrate these constraints using the case of compensable injury in the Australian context. Design: Between September and December 2012, a qualitative investigation involving face-to-face semistructured interviews examined the knowledge, attitudes and practices of general practitioners (GPs) facilitating return to work in people wi..