In recent years, virtue theories have enjoyed a renaissance of interest among general and medical ethicists. This book offers a virtue-based ethic for medicine, the health professions, and health care. Beginning with a historical account of the concept of virtue, the authors construct a theory of the place of the virtues in medical practice. Their theory is grounded in the nature and ends of medicine as a special kind of human activity. The concepts of virtue, the virtues, and the virtuous physician are examined along with the place of the virtues of trust, compassion, prudence, justice,...

The explosive growth of science and medicine in recent times has raised a host of ethical issues. This book reviews major advances in biology and medicine and explores their ethical implications. Organized by stage of human life--from birth to death--it guides the reader through the critical issues that face our technologically advanced society. Each section contains a sketch of the scientific research in a particular field and then discusses the issues that challenge our ethical and moral principles, social frameworks, and public policies. A world-class group of contributors from biology,...

This volume is dedicated to the philosophy of medicine advanced by Edmund D. Pellegrino, a renowned physician educator and philosopher. Pellegrino's thinking about the philosophy of medicine centers on the importance of illness in the life of the patient, and the professional relationship established by promising to alleviate suffering. From this relationship norms are established that contribute to the staying power of medicine as a moral enterprise.
Chapters are included from established thinkers and newcomers to the field, all of whom have been influenced by Pellegrino. Some chapters...

claim was that he had faced a conflict of duties pitting his legal duty not to kill against his duty as a physician to relieve his patient's unbearable suffering. He was acquitted on the important grounds of conflict of duty. These grounds are based on a concept in Dutch law called "force majeure" 4 which recognizes extenuating circumstances such as conflicts of duty. The acquittal was upheld by the Lower Court of Alkmaar, but revoked by an Amsterdam court of appeal. The case went on to the Supreme Court, but before the Supreme Court's decision was issued, the Royal Dutch Medical Association...

Culture, Health, and Social Change is the first of three volumes on Aging conceived for the International Library of Ethics, Law, and the New Medicine. Leading scholars from a range of disciplines contest some of the predominant paradigms on aging, and critically assess modern trends in social health policy. How we approach and understand "aging" will have indelible effects on existing and future elder citizens. Acknowledging the cultural variances that exist in the human experience of aging is therefore of vital importance in order to...

Caring for Our Elders is the second of three volumes on Aging conceived for the International Library of Ethics, Law, and the New Medicine. Leading scholars from a range of disciplines address some of the major issues in elder care facing modern nations: familial duties of care, the future of social welfare systems, housing, dementia, abuse and neglect.

Decisions at the End of Life is the last volume in a trilogy on Aging conceived for the International Library of Ethics, Law, and the New Medicine. Leading scholars from a range of disciplines examine some of the most emotive topics in the study of aging: assessing quality of life, improving end-of-life care, palliative care, euthanasia, and consent to research.

This book arises from a two-fold conviction. The first is that autonomy, despite recent critiques about its importance in bioethics and philosophy of medicine, and the traditional resistance of medicine to its "intrusion" into the doctor-patient relation, is a fundamental building block of an individual's identity and mechanisms for dealing with illness, disease, and incapacity. As such it is an essential component in the health care professional's armamentarium employed to bring about healing. Furthennore, it functions in a similar way to assist the health professional in his or her...

Moral capacity is an important feature of what it means to be human. In this volume, the contributors have taken on the daunting task of trying to distinguish between legal and moral capacity. This distinction is difficult at times for clinicians, philosophers and legal scholars alike. Part of the challenge of defining moral capacity lies in the difficulty of adequately categorizing it. For this reason, the editors have chosen to divide the book into three parts. The first looks at the concepts involved in the discussion of moral capacity; the second considers the role of moral capacity in...

Culture, Health, and Social Change is the first of three volumes on Aging conceived for the International Library of Ethics, Law, and the New Medicine. Leading scholars from a range of disciplines contest some of the predominant paradigms on aging, and critically assess modern trends in social health policy. How we approach and understand "aging" will have indelible effects on existing and future elder citizens. Acknowledging the cultural variances that exist in the human experience of aging is therefore of vital importance in order to respond to individual...