What is the scope of a physician’s duty of disclosure to a patient?

The law imposes an obligation on a physician to disclose to a patient all material attendant risks of a proposed procedure before obtaining the patient’s consent to the procedure. The principles governing the scope of that duty in any particular situation were articulated by Laskin C.J. in Hopp v. Lepp, supra at p. 210 as follows: In summary, the decided cases appear to indicate that, in obtaining the consent of a patient for the performance upon him of a surgical operation, a surgeon, generally, should answer any specific questions posed by the patient as to the risks involved and should, without being questioned, disclose to him the nature of the proposed operation, its gravity, any material risks and any special or unusual risks attendant upon the performance of the operation. However, having said that, it should be added that the scope of the duty of disclosure and whether or not it has been breached are matters which must be decided in relation to the circumstances of each particular case.