Decision-Making Authority
The majority of the physicians surveyed (65%) believed that, across the scenarios, decision-making authority regarding lung transplantation rests with the parents. A minority of physicians (5%) believed that the child had the ultimate decisional authority in all scenarios. Only 30% of physicians altered their responses based on age and maturity level. Half of these physicians felt the patient held decisional authority if she was older, independent of maturity level. There appeared to be significant differences across the four scenarios varying age and maturity level (Cochran’s Q p = 0.008), but there was no significant difference between any of these individual subgroups with regards to the effects of either age or maturity level. Nonetheless, the data suggest a trend towards an effect of age but not maturity level in decisional authority, which was granted to the parents of a mature and immature 11-year-old by 95% and 90% of physicians respectively, in comparison to 70% of physicians when the child was 16 years old irrespective of maturity (Figure 1).