In the last fifty years, average overall health status has increased more or less in parallel with a much celebrated decline in mortality, attributed mostly to poverty reduction, sanitation, nutrition, housing, immunization, and improved medical care. It is becoming increasingly clear, however, that these achievements were not equally distributed. In most countries, while some social groups have benefited significantly, the situation of others has stagnated or may even have worsened. If health is a prerequisite to a person functioning as an agent, inequalities in health constitute inequalities in people's capability to function - a denial of equality of opportunity. So why should a concern with health equity be singled out from the pursuit of social justice more generally? Can existing theories of justice provide an adequate account of health equity? And what ethical problems arise in evaluating health inequalities? These are some of the important questions that this book addresses in building an interdisciplinary understanding of health equity. With contributions from distinguished philosophers, anthropologists, economists, and public-health specialists, it centres on five major themes: what is health equity?; health equity and social justice; responsibilities for health; ethical issues in health evaluation; and anthropological perspectives.

Each year, neonatal Intensive care units (NICUs) in the U.S. and around the world help thousands of sick or premature newborns survive. NICUs are committed to the ideals of family-centered care, which encourages shared decision-making between parents and NICU caregivers. In cases of infants with conditions marked by high mortality, morbidity, or great suffering, family-centered care affirms the right of parents to assist in making decisions regarding aggressive treatment for their infant. Often, these parents' difficult and intimate decisions are shaped profoundly by their religious beliefs. In light of this, what precisely are the teachings of the major world religious traditions about the status and care of the premature or sick newborn? Few studies have grappled with what major religious traditions teach about the care of the newborn or how these teachings may bear on parents' decisions. This volume seeks to fill this gap, providing information on religious teachings about the newborn to the multidisciplinary teams of NICU professionals (neonatologists, advance practice nurses, social workers), as well as to parents of NICU patients, and students of bioethics. In chapters dealing with Judaism, Catholicism, Denominational Protestantism, Evangelical Protestantism, African American Protestantism, Sunni and Shi'a Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Navajo religion, and Seventh Day Adventism, leading scholars develop the teachings of these traditions on the status, treatment, and ritual accompaniments of care of the premature or sick newborn. This is an essential book that will serve as a first resort for clinicians who need to understand the religious dynamics influencing anyone making a difficult decision about her sick newborn.

This is a unique and valuable work, which traces the experiences of over 100 parents who have lived through the loss of a baby. It follows them from pregnancy through to13 months after the death. Based on rigorous scientific research it describes their feelings when crucial decisions are made on behalf of their child, and examines their capacity to take responsibility for such decisions. By analysing those factors which help or hinder them, the book provides guidance to health professionals on how the services they offer may be improved. Neonatologists, paediatricians, midwives and neonatal nurses will find it an essential and enlightening read. Primary care clinicians, intensive care staff and hospital chaplains will discover insights which help them to support a wider group of patients and relatives.

Sparking controversy in medical, social and professional circles, the nation's most respected medical ethicist strikes at the heart of America's growing health care crisis--the care of the aged. The New York Times Book Review calls Setting Limits "A pivotal work . . . the benchmark for future moral, medical and policy discussions of aging".

Published in 1998, this book is a collected volume of papers from the first conference of the European Network for Biomedical ethics. The main subject of this conference is the ethical assessment of IVF in view of its concrete application as an infertility treatment and the consideration of possible alternatives for use. Twenty years after the introduction and the establishment of this therapy a more concrete evaluation of its medical indications, social conditions and consequences, the psychological consequences for the women involved and the parent-child relationship becomes possible. The legal and ethical evaluation of the reproduction technology as regards for example the legal and moral status of supernumery embyos in cryo-conservation has also to be considered in a European perspective. The ethical evaluation concentrates today on the new evolution that IVF technology takes in relation to the extension of diagnostics possibilities due to genetic research. Little work has been done on the connection between IVF and genetic diagnostics and therapy, so the medical and ethical evaluation of the connecting lines are also included in the book.

There has been a remarkable growth of interest in the ethical dimension of economic affairs. Whilst the interest in business ethics has been long-standing, it has been given renewed emphasis by high profile scandals in the world of business and finance. At the same time many economists, dissatisfied with the discipline's emphasis on self-interest and individualism, and by the asocial nature of much economic theory, have sought to enlarge the scope of economics by looking at ethical questions.
In this volume a group of interdisciplinary scholars provide contributions which include evaluations of work in business ethics, empirical studies of such issues as social and ethical investing, the place of ethics in the new economics and perspectives from other disciplines.

This book examines major ethical issues in nursing practice. It eschews the abstract approaches of bioethics and medical ethics, and takes as its point of departure the difficulties nurses experience practising within the confines of a biomedical model and a hierarchical health care system. It breaks out of the rigid categories of mainstream health care ethics (autonomy, beneficence, quality of life, utilitarianism) and provides case studies, experiences and challenging lines of thought for the new professional nurse. The contributors examine the role of the nurse in relation to themes such as informed consent, privacy and dignity, and confidentiality. Nursing accountability is also considered in relation to the contemporary Western health care system as a whole. New and critical essays examine the nature of professional codes, care, medical judgement, nursing research and the law. Controversial issues, such as feeding those who cannot or will not eat, the epidemiology of HIV and dilemmas of choice and risk in the care of the elderly are tackled honestly and openly.

This is the first book to take nursing ethics beyond stock 'moral concepts' to a critical examination of the fundamental assumptions underlying the very nature of nursing. It takes as its point of departure the difficulties nurses experience practising within the confines of a bioethical model of health and illness and a hierarchical, technocratic health care system. The contributors go on to deal openly and honestly with controversial issues faced by nurses, such as euthanasia and HIV.

To understand the ethical issues raised by genetic counselling, it is necessary for the practitioner, the detached observer and the student to be aware of different perspectives. This work includes contributions from health professionals engaged in genetic counselling, and also from observers and critics of genetic counselling who have backgrounds in law, philosophy, biology, social science, and in advocacy on behalf of those with mental handicap. This diversity is designed to assist health professionals in examining their activities with a fresh eye; it may also help the observer-critic to understand the ethical problems that arise in genetic counselling practice. It is natural for health professionals to focus their concern on the immediate questions raised by individual clients, and for detached observers to consider the broader social implications of the subject.

To understand the ethical issues raised by genetic counselling, it is necessary for the practitioner, the detached observer and the student to be aware of different perspectives. This work includes contributions from health professionals engaged in genetic counselling, and also from observers and critics of genetic counselling who have backgrounds in law, philosophy, biology, social science, and in advocacy on behalf of those with mental handicap. This diversity is designed to assist health professionals in examining their activities with a fresh eye; it may also help the observer-critic to understand the ethical problems that arise in genetic counselling practice. It is natural for health professionals to focus their concern on the immediate questions raised by individual clients, and for detached observers to consider the broader social implications of the subject.

The focus of bioethical debates on exceptional cases neglects the underlying values-like justice and community-that would lend to a broader, more well-rounded understanding of today's world. Discussions of ethical problems in health care too often concentrate on exceptional cases. Bioethical controversies triggered by experimental drugs, gene-edited babies, or life extension are understandably fascinating: they showcase the power of medical science and technology while addressing anxieties concerning health, disease, suffering, and death. However, the focus on rare individual cases in the media spotlight turns attention away from more pressing ethical issues that impact global populations, such as access to health care, safe food and water, and the prevention of emerging infectious diseases. In Bizarre Bioethics, Henk A.M.J. ten Have argues that this focus on bizarre cases leads to bizarre bioethics with a narrow agenda for ethical debate. In other words, although these extreme cases are undeniably real, they present a limited and skewed view of everyday moral reality. This focus also assumes that individuals are rational decision-makers, so that the role of feelings and emotions can be downgraded. Larger questions related to justice, solidarity, community, meaning, and ambiguity are not appreciated. Such questions used to be posed by philosophical and theological traditions, but they have been exorcised and marginalized in the development of bioethics. Science, ten Have writes, is not a value-free endeavor that provides facts and evidence: it is driven by underlying value perspectives that are often based on metaphors and world views from philosophical and theological traditions. Drawing on a rich analysis of the literature, ten Have explains how bioethical discussion can be enriched by these metaphors and develops a broader approach that critically delves into the imaginative world views that determine understanding of the world and human existence. Examining the roles of the metaphors of ghosts, monsters, pilgrims, prophets, and relics, ten Have illustrates how science and medicine are animated by imaginations that fuel the search for hope, salvation, healing, and a predictable future. Bizarre Bioethics invites students, researchers, policymakers and teachers interested in ethics and health care to think about the value perspectives on health and disease today.

Enter the world of organ transplantation and develop a new understanding of processes and techniques for working effectively with patients in this increasing medical population. This multidisciplinary overview of organ transplantation contains chapters by major figures in the medical arena, internationally known bioethics writers, and experienced chaplains from the clinical setting of transplantation, as well as respected pastoral theologians. The authors, who include Art Caplan, Donald Capps, and Jack Copeland, explain transplantation completely for the nonmedical person and delve into the myriad ethical and religious issues and controversies surrounding organ donation and transplantation. Enlightening chapters clarify issues and help readers better understand the transplantation process, making them more effective in their work with transplant patients. Organ Transplantation in Religious, Ethical and Social Context is divided into three sections. The first emphasizes transplantation as a team effort. Chapters focus on the various roles of chaplains and other team members.Section two addresses ethical questions which arise from transplantation and organ donation and includes interfaith perspectives. The third section is dedicated to theological and pastoral views concerning transplantation. Some specific topics discussed in this book include: a surgeon's perspective of the role of the chaplain influence of psychosocial factors in the heart transplantation decision process ministry to organ recipients and their families the special relationship between the transplant coordinator and the transplant patient Catholic and interfaith perspectives on organ donation using the Psalms as a pastoral resource with transplant patients Hospital chaplains, transplant social workers, transplant coordinators, and other professionals interested or involved in the process of organ transplantation will find this book to be full of interesting and thought-provoking insights and information.

Law, Palliative Care and Dying critically examines the role of the legal framework in shaping the boundaries of palliative care practice. The work underlines the importance of a distinct legal framework for specialist palliative care which can provide clarity for both the healthcare professional and the patient. It examines the legal and ethical justifications for specialist palliative care practices and, in doing so, it questions the legitimacy of the distinction between euthanasia and practices such as palliative sedation. Moreover, this work discusses the influence of a human rights discourse on palliative care and examines the contribution of autonomy, dignity, and the right to palliative care. This book includes detailed comparative research on several European jurisdictions. The jurisdictions illustrate varied approaches to palliative care regulation and promotion. In this manner, the role of professional guidelines and legislation are drawn out and common themes in the regulation of palliative care emerge.

This collection of essays, with an extended commentary by the editor, is concerned with developments in reproductive technology and the possibilities of genetic engineering. The volume provides a forum for debate between science and society. Leading scientists in the field explain the nature and goals of "test tube" reproduction and genetic engineering, and their eugenic implications. Other papers draw out the legal and ethical problems raised by these developments. The ethical dilemmas are discussed both from the point of view of secular moral philosophy and from a theological perspective. The extended commentary attempts to place these questions in the context of a social ethic, rather than an individualist one, in contrast to the approach adopted by the Warnock Report.

Cultivating Moral Character and Virtue in Professional Practice is a pioneering collection of essays focused on the place of character and virtue in professional practice. Professional practices usually have codes of conduct designed to ensure good conduct; but while such codes may be necessary and useful, they appear far from sufficient, since many recent public scandals in professional life seem to have been attributable to failures of personal moral character. This book argues that there is a pressing need to devote more attention in professional education to the cultivation or development of such moral qualities as integrity, courage, self-control, service and selflessness. Featuring contributions from distinguished leaders in the application of virtue ethics to professional practice, such as Sarah Banks, Ann Gallagher, Geoffrey Moore, Justin Oakley and Nancy Sherman, the volume looks beyond traditional professions to explore the ethical dimensions of a broad range of important professional practices. Inspired by a successful international and interdisciplinary conference on the topic, the book examines various ways of promoting moral character and virtue in professional life from the general ethical perspective of contemporary neo-Aristotelian virtue theory. The professional concerns of this work are of global significance and the book will be valuable reading for all working in contemporary professional practices. It will be of particular interest to academics, practitioners and postgraduate students in the fields of education, medicine, nursing, social work, business and commerce and military service.

In his famous seminar on ethics, Jacques Lacan uses this question as his departure point for a re-examination of Freud's work and the experience of psychoanalysis in relation to ethics. Delving into the psychoanalyst's inevitable involvement with ethical questions, Lacan clarifies many of his key concepts. During the seminar he discusses the problem of sublimation, the paradox of jouissance, the essence of tragedy, and the tragic dimension of analytical experience. One of the most influential French intellectuals of this century, Lacan is seen here at the height of his powers.

Paternalistic intervention, especially in the context of modern medicine and health care, is the issue of this monograph, which aims to define and morally assess paternalistic interventions through a defined conceptual background. The method employed for this purpose is that of applied philosophical ethics in the analytic tradition. It is argued that there is a marked distinction between strong and weak paternalism. Strong paternalism is defined as the violation of the autonomy of a patient, when that person is capable of autonomous decision-making. Weak paternalism is the violation of autonomy when a person is temporarily incapable of self-determined decision-making.

In this book, public health ethicist Daniel S. Goldberg sets out to characterize the subjective experience of pain and its undertreatment within the US medical establishment, and puts forward public policy recommendations for ameliorating the undertreatment of pain. The book begins from the position that the overwhelming focus on opioid analgesics as a means for improving the undertreatment of pain is flawed, and argues instead that dominant Western models of biomedicine and objectivity delegitimize subjective knowledge of the body and pain in the US. This general intolerance for the subjectivity of pain is part of a specific American culture of pain in which a variety of actors take part, including not only physicians and health care providers, but also pain sufferers, caregivers, and policymakers. Concentrating primarily on bioethics, history, and public policy, the book brings a truly interdisciplinary approach to an urgent practical ethical problem. Taking up the practical challenge, the book culminates in a series of policy recommendations that provide pathways for moral agents to move beyond contests over drug policy to policy arenas that, based on the evidence, hold more promise in their capacity to address the devastating and inequitable undertreatment of pain in the US.

This title was first published in 2000: This third volume of proceedings of the European Network for Biomedical Ethics focuses on the ethical issues surrounding the debates on reproductive medicine and genetics in human procreation. Central issues include procreation and parenthood, moral protection of the human embryo and foetus, autonomy and recognition, social implications, moral reasoning in applied ethics, legal regulations of assisted procreation, genetic diagnosis and gene therapy. The legal regulation paper evaluates the central laws and guidelines of European countries.

This volume speaks directly to the issues that underlie sexual dynamics between clinicians and clients. Substantially updated and enlarged, this second edition addresses head-on the heightened openness and awareness of the contemporary consulting room.

Published in 2004, this collection will encourage and foster informed discussion of key issues as society comes to grips with the implications of genetic engineering, the mapping and sequencing of the human genome, and the advent of the post-genomic era. The contributors are prominent social scientists, health specialists, journalists, bioethicists and commercial representatives from the UK, Finland, Germany, Holland and Norway who are at the leading edge of current research. the book will therefore appeal to the interested public, health and other professionals, teachers and students. This book was originally published as part of the Cardiff Papers in Qualitative Research series edited by Paul Atkinson, Sara Delamont and Amanda Coffey. The series publishes original sociological research that reflects the tradition of qualitative and ethnographic inquiry developed at Cardiff. The series includes monographs reporting on empirical research, edited collections focussing on particular themes, and texts discussing methodological developments and issues.

The learning and practice of medical ethics in a clinical setting requires many of the same structures and dynamics as the learning and practice of clinical medicine. In this study, basic yet controversial issues such as death and dying, truth-telling, confidentiality, and physician/patient relationships are treated in great depth. "Ethical Practice in Clinical Medicine" presents the theoretical sources of virtue ethics and then works through a number of medical ethics cases using the materials from the sources. In addition, it addresses directly practical clinical problems from an historical perspective by using classic texts by philosophers such as Plato, Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas, William James and John Dewey.

Law, Immunization and the Right to Die focuses on the urgent matter of legal appeals and judicial decisions on assisted death. Drawing on key cases from the United Kingdom and Canada, the book focuses on the problematic paternalism of legal decisions that currently deny assisted dying and questions why the law fails to recognize what many describe as "compassionate motives" for assisted death. When cases are analyzed as discourses that are part of a larger socio-political logic of governance, judicial decisions, it is argued here, reveal themselves as relying on the construction of neoliberal fictions - fictions that are here elucidated with reference to Michel Foucault's theoretical insights on pastoral power and Roberto Esposito's philosophical thesis on immunization. Challenging the socio-political logic of neoliberalism, the issue of assisted dying goes beyond the predominant legal concern with protecting - or immunizing - individuals from one another, in favor of minimal interference. This book calls for a new kind of politics: one that might affirm people and their finitude both more collectively, and more compassionately.

Designed to challenge the ethical basis for much of the legal regulation of matters surrounding birth, this series of essays explores such controversial topics as whether surrogacy should be allowed, and what guidelines are needed to control in vitro fertilization programmes.

This book explores the nurses' lived experience of spirituality as a means of helping patients to cope with loss associated with terminal or chronic disease. It describes how nurses use their personal resources in caring for those with chronic and terminal conditions.