In this paper, I provide a brief sketch of the purposes that medical ethics serves and what makes for good medical ethics. Medical ethics can guide clinical practice and biomedical research, contribute to the education of clinicians, advance thinking in the field, and direct healthcare policy. Although these are distinct activities, they are alike in several critical respects. Good medical ethi...

Aim Psychiatrists often encounter ethical dilemmas in their daily clinical practice. Clinical ethics consultations (CECs) have been recently increasing, especially general hospitals. However, the current situation psychiatric field is unclear. This study clarifies problems psychiatry and determines need for CECs. Methods We conducted an anonymous self-administered questionnaire survey February ...

The Competent Authority has been notified. The clinical investigator is anxious to begin. Just when the process of conducting a clinical investigation is proceeding as planned, the ethics committee issues an unfavourable opinion. This article discusses the actions that should be taken to avoid this occurrence and how to meet other requirements related to ethics committees.

BACKGROUND Despite the recent increase in activity in the field of medical ethics education, few evaluative studies have been carried out. Most studies have taken place in North America, in curricula where teaching is discipline-based, and have concentrated on outcome rather than on the curricular processes adopted. AIM To evaluate the process of medical ethics education in the first year of ...

Ethical reasoning and decision-making may be thought of as 'professional skills', and in this sense are as relevant to efficient clinical practice as the biomedical and clinical sciences are to the diagnosis of a patient's problem. Despite this, however, undergraduate medical programmes in ethics tend to focus on the teaching of bioethical theories, concepts and/or prominent ethical issues such...

Ethics education in dentistry is a requirement for accreditation. Despite universal adoption of ethics courses, there is ongoing discussion about the appropriate content of these courses and about methods to engage students. Faculty who teach ethics must select a limited set of topics from the broad fields of professional ethics, bioethics, and the humanities. The purpose of this article is to ...

OBJECTIVES The objective of this research is to analyse the evolution and nature of published empirical research in the fields of medical ethics and bioethics. DESIGN Retrospective quantitative study of nine peer reviewed journals in the field of bioethics and medical ethics (Bioethics, Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics, Hastings Center Report, Journal of Clinical Ethics, Journal of Me...