id	author	title	date	pages	extension	mime	words	sentences	flesch	summary	cache	txt
cord-338600-wpfcxnyu	Stewart, Cameron	Mental Capacity Assessments for COVID-19 Patients: Emergency Admissions and the CARD Approach	2020-11-09		.txt	text/plain	3108	171	52	Valid consent requires an appropriate standard of information provision and of voluntariness and, crucially, for patients to demonstrate the capacity to make decisions about their medical treatment (Lamont, Stewart, and Chiarella 2016a, 2016b) . In this article we define mental capacity, restate the legal test, and provide practical advice on how to assess the capacity of COVID-19 patients in emergency and critical care settings, including a short list of questions which flag capacity issues which we refer to as the CARD approach. Capacity forms the basis of the legal doctrines of consent to treatment (the process of gaining permission to treat) and informed consent (the duty to provide material information regarding the nature, purpose, benefits, and risks of having or not having treatment (see Reibl v Hughes [1980] The common law test for mental capacity, which emerged from the case of Re C (Adult: Refusal of Treatment) [1994] 1 WLR 290 (see Box 1), requires a patient to be able to 1.	./cache/cord-338600-wpfcxnyu.txt	./txt/cord-338600-wpfcxnyu.txt