This week we released updated ethics guidance for doctors, reflecting contemporary issues such as sustainability, medical innovation, and cultural safety.
The AMA Code of Ethics 2025 — last revised in 2016 — sets out the principles and standards that guide doctors in their relationships with patients, colleagues, and the broader community.
The release of the latest Code of Ethics comes at a pivotal time in medicine, with doctors navigating increasingly complex challenges across the health system.
The Code of Ethics advises doctors to provide patient-centred care fairly, justly, impartially and without discrimination — treating all patients with respect, dignity, and compassion, and doing so in a culturally safe and appropriate manner.
It provides broad guidance, covering a wide array of topics including the protection of patient information, financial consent, conflicts of interest, health-related research, and more.
The 2025 edition introduces issues not previously addressed in past Codes, such as sustainability, medical innovation, cultural safety, power imbalances, dual loyalties, and telehealth.
It also expands on longstanding areas including informed consent, patient decision making, and decision-making capacity.
In addition to guiding individual doctors, the Code continues to provide an overarching ethical framework for the development and revision of broader AMA position statements.
