Dear SteveR, Have you ever been in a situation when you've had to make a decision based on gut feeling combined with sound clinical judgement and the benefit of experience? I thought not. Have you ever lain awake at three am with the events of a day going around in your head and wishing desperately that you'd made a different decision - because if you had the likelihood of someone surviving to see the following day might have been greater? I thought not. Has it crossed your mind that this patient might have seen Tom's 'lie' for what it was had he been in full command of his faculties? Thought not. Did it not occur to you that whatever the technical right and wrongs of this situation, Tom did what he did in in the best interests of his patient? He wasn't trumping something up to contravene the 1983 Mental Health Act, or the new Mental Capacity Act - he was looking at a patient who he knew was physically ill. Of course it didn't? Now go away and play on the My Little Pony website if you want right and wrong in black & white. When you feel mature enough to come and discuss what happens in the real world - don't bother us.