“Through a glass, darkly”: the clinical and ethical implications of Munchausen syndrome

DeWitt, Dawn E; Bhat, Ravi; Ward, Stephanie

doi:10.5694/j.1326-5377.2010.tb03411.x

Topics

To the Editor: Robertson and Kerridge1 criticised our article “Patient privacy versus protecting the patient and the health system from harm”2 based on an interpretation that we were advocating notification for all patients with somatisation disorders, but our recommendation for a confidential notification system pertained specifically to factitious disorder.

1 School of Rural Health, University of Melbourne, Shepparton, VIC.
2 Goulburn Valley Area Mental Health Service, Shepparton, VIC.
3 Western Health, Melbourne, VIC.

Correspondence: ddewitt@unimelb.edu.au

1. Robertson MD, Kerridge IH. “Through a glass, darkly”: the clinical and ethical implications of Munchausen syndrome. Med J Aust 2009; 191: 217-219. <eMJA full text> <MJA full text>
2. DeWitt DE, Ward SA, Prabhu S, Warton B. Patient privacy versus protecting the patient and the health system from harm: a case study. Med J Aust 2009; 191: 213-216. <eMJA full text> <MJA full text>
3. Huffman JC, Stern TA. The diagnosis and treatment of Munchausen’s syndrome. Gen Hosp Psychiatry 2003; 25: 358-363.
4. Amarasingham R, Plantinga L, Diener-West M, et al. Clinical information technologies and inpatient outcomes: a multiple hospital study. Arch Intern Med 2009; 169: 108-114.
5. Einstein AJ, Henzlova MJ, Rajagopalan S. Estimating risk of cancer associated with radiation exposure from 64-slice computed tomography coronary angiography. JAMA 2007; 298: 317-323.

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