Santo Domingo.- Bioethics and medical law specialists stated that the new Dominican Penal Code does not represent a threat to health professionals nor does it seek to persecute the practice of medicine, but rather to establish with greater clarity the responsibilities and guarantees for both doctors and patients.
The position was presented during the panel “Penal Code: progress or threat?”, organized by the Santo Domingo Institute of Technology (INTEC) together with the National Bioethics Commission (CNB), where legal experts and health professionals analyzed the possible effects of the new legislation.
During the meeting, the participants pointed out that part of the concern generated within the medical sector is due to incorrect interpretations and information disseminated without a deep analysis of the content of the regulations.
Dr. Togarma Rodríguez, a member of the National Bioethics Commission, explained that medicine involves complex scenarios and that the evaluation of a medical action must focus on whether the professional applied the corresponding protocols and used the available resources to protect the patient’s life.
Rodríguez maintained that the new legislation does not establish persecution against doctors, nor does it imply that any negative outcome in a treatment automatically generates criminal liability.
More Read
We recommend reading: Eduardo Saint-Hilaire calls for the elimination of prison sentences for defamation in the Penal Code revision
“It is not that because the law has arrived they are going to go out and look for all the doctors like a witch hunt to take them to prison. Nothing to do with that,” he stated.
The specialist also highlighted the importance of clinical documentation, considering that medical records will be fundamental to demonstrate that the decisions made were justified and in accordance with established procedures.
More Read
During the panel, it was also highlighted that one of the novelties of the Penal Code is the incorporation of criminal liability for legal entities, which will allow hospitals, clinics, and other institutions to be held accountable for failures linked to administrative or management processes.
Lawyer Pedro Jiménez, a specialist in medical law, considered that the reform represents an important change compared to legislation that has been in force for more than a century, by incorporating constitutional principles and greater guarantees for citizens and professionals.
“From normative silence we moved to a block of guarantees,” stated Jiménez, who explained that criminal liability will continue to be individual and that each person must answer for their own actions or omissions.
Although they valued the progress of the new regulations, the specialists indicated that some aspects can still be revised to avoid ambiguous interpretations and favor a proper application of the law.
From a bioethical perspective, Dr. Miguel Suazo, permanent advisor to the National Bioethics Commission and professor at INTEC, pointed out that the analysis of the Penal Code must seek a balance between the protection of patients and the legal security of healthcare personnel.
“Not everything legal is moral, nor is everything moral legal. The task of ethics will be to try to bring the moral closer to the legal,” stated Suazo.
The specialist added that the new legislation strengthens the protection of human dignity and called for expanding the discussion with the participation of doctors, lawyers, patients, and other social sectors.
At the end of the activity, the participants agreed that one of the main challenges will be to strengthen the legal training of health personnel, improve the culture of clinical documentation, and promote alternative mechanisms to resolve conflicts between doctors and patients.
The panel was held virtually by INTEC and the National Bioethics Commission, moderated by Dr. Selma Zapata, president of the CNB.
