Article The traditional Hippocratic

belief that one could do almost anything on a patient as long as the principles of beneficence (best interests) and non-maleficence (no harm) were upheld has been considerably revolutionised over the last century. Paternalism, the belief that the health care practitioner should protect or advance the interests of the patient even if contrary to the patient’s own immediate desires or freedom of choice, no longer has a place in the health care context. Pursuant to the Nuremburg Trials, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and several other codes and guidelines emanating from international bodies such as the World Medical Association un-derscore, among other ethical tenets, the value of autonomy and self-determination. Autonomous actions are the outcome of deliberations and choices by rational agents as persons in the moral sense. Rational persons meet the criteria necessar