Treatment Adherence in the Focus of Bioethics

Abstract

The article examines key aspects of patient compliance with medical recommendations and prescriptions through the lens of bioethical principles. It analyzes problems arising in the context of medical-genetic counseling, as well as the role of advance directives in ensuring treatment adherence. Particular attention is paid to the principle of respect for patient autonomy and its influence on a physician's recommendations. It is shown that advance directives are used to involve patients in the decision-making process regarding their own health and well-being, while also defining a set of interventions to be used in crisis situations. The conclusion is drawn that advance directives shape a patient's partnership position in their relationship with a physician, enhance the patient's awareness of their own health, and make them an active participant in the healing process. The article explores the relevance of a bioethical approach to issues of patient trust in the healthcare system. The specific problem of adherence to medical prescriptions during a pandemic is also addressed. It is demonstrated that the crisis of scientific expertise and the social authority of the scientific expert, the formation of an infodemic regime, and the phenomena of post-truth and post-veracity are necessarily linked to the fragmentation of the scientific worldview, and to the alienation of humanistic values in the depersonalizing social practices of a digitized society as a society of platform capitalism. Based on a comprehensive study of the compliance issue, the authors conclude that the problem of treatment adherence should be viewed as an indicator of the quality of the relationship between the medical system, the individual, and society, which is testing the modern system of organizing social trust.