The provision of health care represents a nexus between law and ethics.There are a multitude of texts which carefully and skilfully cover medical law, medical ethics or a combination of both. These books tend
to be aimed at either the medical or legal professional (or student) and thus present complex, theoretical discussions of what are, essentially, practical questions. The absence of texts which provide a practical guide to both ethical and legal issues that arise in the context of medical treatment provided the impetus for the writing of this book. This gap, combined with the increasing emphasis on problem-based learning in both medical and law schools, presented what seemed to us the obvious model for a useful text.