Ethics can be the elephant in the room. Nobody wants to talk about it, but it's not going anywhere. People aren't always comfortable talking about the deeply held personal values that shape their personal sense of ethics. They fear being judged, or confronting people who see a situation as categorically right or wrong instead of shaded by individual ethical considerations. It's a gray area in a profession that values black and white, that values precision and decisiveness. Is the bone broken? Does the patient have an infection? Has the tumor spread? What is the dosage? What is the prescribed treatment? "Coming up with the right answer is a huge part of medicine, and when you can't feel confident that you came up with the right answer, you might think, 'I just would rather not get into that territory,'" Rushton says.