OBJECTIVE To identify and describe the current state of clinical ethics support services in the UK. DESIGN A series of questionnaire surveys of key individuals in National Health Service (NHS) trusts, health authorities, health boards, local research ethics committees and health professional organisations. Interviews with chairmen/women of clinical ethics committees identified in the surveys....

This article begins a new six-part series in the Journal of the American Medical Directors Association devoted to medical ethics. Each issue, a case will be presented from the Ethics committee at the Hebrew Rehabilitation Center for Aged (HRCA) in Boston, Massachusetts. Following a description of the case and a discussion of the ethical issues that the case raises, Dr. Steven Levenson will disc...

In 1992, the Joint Commission on the Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations ( JCAHO) passed a mandate that all its approved hospitals put in place a means for addressing ethical concerns. Although the particular process the hospital uses to address such concerns—ethics consultant, ethics forum, ethics committee—may vary, the hospital or healthcare ethics committee (HEC) is used most often. I...

Ethics committees are the most important practical instrument of clinical ethics in Belgium and fulfil three tasks: the ethical review of experimental protocols, advising on the ethical aspects of healthcare practice, and ethics consultation. In this article the authors examine the current situation of ethics committees in Belgium from the perspective of clinical ethics. Firstly, the most impor...

BACKGROUND There exists a need throughout the North to increase capacity to address issues of health ethics and for community members to better understand and share their perspectives on this topic. Ethics comes down to weighing rights and wrongs, evaluating differing needs and understandings, acknowledging the many shades of grey and doing our best to come up with the just, fair and moral appr...

According to the amended Drugs and Cosmetics Rules of the Government of India, participants in clinical trial are entitled to medical treatment and financial compensation in the event of permanent injury or death, but the quantum of compensation is to be decided by same Ethics Committee that sanctioned the trial in the first place. If there is a dispute regarding the amount of compensation the ...