Using courtroom resolutions of real bioethical disputes as its focus, Standard of Care explores the fundamental value conflicts confronting medicine and society. This case-based approach illuminates the value choices with which the power of modern medicine confronts us. The author urges health professionals to go beyond the minimalist legal "standard of care" by promoting a vigorous, patient-centered medical ethics based on both respect for the human rights of individual patients and resposibility to society. If modern medicine is to enhance human life, a reconceptualization of law as the beginning of ethical discourse, rather than as an instrument to end it, is essential.