What is the application of the principle of prior informed consent?

Informed consent in the medical context applies in two primary areas: (1) medical procedures, and (2) medical research. It is a principle of relatively recent origin in the law.

As a legal principle it is something of an offshoot of the reverse proposition that an unwanted or "unconsented to" touching is in the nature of assault and battery, which was first clearly set forth in a New York case (Schloendorff vs. Society of New York Hospital, 211 N.Y. 125, 105 N.E. 92 (1914), Opinion by Louis Brandeis). Actually there was at least one prior case in Illinois on point, but Schloendorff's opinion went on at length and is a good fundamental treatise on the subject. As to medical research, perhaps the most important initial case in the area revolved around what was called the "Tuskegee" experiment that was finally terminated in 1972. Subjects with syphilis were told they were being treated but were in fact not given proven treatment and were even discouraged from seeking help elsewhere. This travesty went on for some 40 years until somebody leaked the truth -- after people died or contracted the disease from subjects and children were born with it.

Courts wrestled with the legal concepts involved. Ultimately it has come to mean that you as the patient (in a medical procedure) or as the subject (of medical research) are entitled to be given as much information as is available about the situation as well as its possible outcomes so that you can make your own decision about whether to undergo the procedure or participate in the study, based on the information provided.

"Informed consent" is today a fundamental biomedical ethical concept, tenet and mantra that is the subject of many books, articles, lectures and presentations both here and internationally. To attempt to survey it in this context would be a disservice to the concept's breadth and depth. However, suffice it to say that if you need to have surgery for a broken leg and the surgeon does not explain that after the procedure you will not be able to stand without assistance and then afterwards you try to stand up and you fall down and break your arm, you may have a claim against the surgeon for negligence resulting in your broken arm.

While the general concept of "consent" applies in other legal settings, we hope this is what you were talking about.