Judge Cannot Compel Medical Exam and Evaluation of Depressed Woman When She Is Capable of Exercising Informed Consent

Cavuoto v. Buchanan County Dep't Soc. Servs., 605 S.E.2d 287 (Va. Ct. App. 2004)

A Virginia law authorizes judicial orders compelling individuals to submit to a medical examination and evaluation (VA. CODE § 37.1- 134.21). A circuit court judge issued such an order for a fifty-one-year-old woman who was suffering from morbid obesity and depression and who had been bedridden for more than two years, following a fire in the house in which she and her husband resided...

Found in DMHL Volume 24 Issue 2