C. The Refusal of Unwanted Medical Care
Informed consent rules and the battery doctrine form the foundation of a rich jurisprudence on the right to refuse medical treatment, which in turn informs how physicians and hospitals respond to a patient's demands or refusals to be treated by a physician of a particular race. A competent patient--or a patient's legally designated surrogate decisionmaker--has a common law and constitutionally protected right to refuse unwanted medical treatment. It follows, then, that a competent patient has the right to refuse the care of a particular healthcare provider, and informed consent rules and the law of battery dictate that the patient's wishes should control.
In any situation in which a patient refuses medical treatment, the healthcare institution must first determine whether the patient is competent to make such a decision. If the institution deems the patient competent, then it must respect her wishes and cease all treatment. Here, the focus is not on the reasonableness of the patient's refusal but rather on the patient's preference. During the determination of competence, or at any other time, it may appear as though the patient is not refusing care per se but is instead refusing to receive treatment from a particular healthcare provider for prejudiced reasons. In that case, standard medical ethics procedures require the hospital to assess whether there are underlying factors that may have prompted the request (such as determining whether the patient is experiencing pressure from family members) and, if so, whether they can be addressed through means other than acceding to the patient's biases (such as through the provision of counseling).
If, however, these factors are absent and the competent patient in the hospital setting cannot be swayed with respect to her demand for or refusal of a provider of a particular race, then the objected-to provider has a legal obligation to stop providing care immediately, and medical ethics counsel that the patient's preferences should be accommodated.
