Health Law and Ethics; Case study 4-37

One of the physicians on staff is telling you about a study that he is doing on his patients. He hopes to have the study published and to receive a grant to expand his research. He offers to hire you to help him with the data collection during your off hours. You accept and begin helping him.

You start collecting data. When you access the file the next day, you realize that he has removed a number of patients from the study. You suspect that they were removed intentionally, but you cannot be sure. You put your suspicions aside and proceed with your work and add more patients to the database. A few days later, more patients have been removed from the database.

When you do some investigation, you discover that the patients who were removed were sicker and/or had a poor outcome.

1. What should you do?

2. What issues are involved in this situation?