Modern medicine has done much in the fields of infectious diseases and emergencies to aid cure. In most other fields, it is mostly control that it aims for, which is another name for palliation. Pharmacology, psychopharmacology included, is mostly directed towards such control and palliation too. The thrust, both of clinicians and research, must now turn decisively towards prevention and cure. Also, longevity with well-being is modern medicine's other big challenge. Advances in vaccines for hypertension, diabetes, (...) cancers etc, deserve attention; as also, the role of meditation, yoga, spirituality etc in preventing disease at various levels. Studies on longevity, life style changes and healthy centenarians deserve special scrutiny to find what aids longevity with wellbeing. A close look at complementary and alternative medicine is needed to find any suitable models they may have, cutting aside their big talk and/or hostility towards mainstream medical care. Medicine is a manifestation of the human eros, and should not become a means of its thanatos. It must realise its true potential, so that eros prevails, and thanatos prevails only ultimately, not prematurely. (shrink)

This essay discusses the role of new mechanical devices put forward in the seventeenth century in anatomy and pathology, showing how several of those devices were promptly deployed in anatomical investigations. I also discuss the role of dead bodies as boundary objects between living bodies and machines, highlighting their problematic status in experimentation and vivisection.

When confronting the issues related to developments in modern medicine and biotechnology, we must repeatedly ask ourselves anew what can and cannot be justified in an ethical sense. For radically new ethical questions seem to arise through innovative techniques such as stem cell research or preimplantation diagnosis — and with them new areas of conflicting interests. If one scrutinizes the previous positions related to this subject, it becomes conspicuous that a multitude of questions has quickly piled up — (...) however, (as in the case of Germany) comprehensive and differentiated views have mostly been lacking. (shrink)

A textbook for undergraduates. Some 70 selections (more than half are new to this edition) follow an introductory essay. Current controversies (surrogacy, genetic engineering, proxy consent) are thoroughly covered. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR.

The jurists, taking as reference the texts and the experiential studies of the period, preached various provisions regarding the issues such as fetal development, full birth or birth and death in this process. The majority made evaluations on the basis of the hadith about the fetal development process -mentioned in three separate periods of forty days-, but it was observed that this did not overlap with some medical guidance. Because the development period expressed by the jurists could not be prolonged, (...) it was determined that this process was completed before according to modern medicine. Jurists stated that he did not have any law regarding the fetus born before this period, since it was based on this period, and evaluated and evaluated whether those born later were alive or not. It has been presented in different jurisprudence in terms of various branches in fiqh, which is called “frequency” of the previous abortion effect after/during the full birth, and which is considered to be soul-blowing at the end of four months. These conflicts affected sons' abilities such as bathing, shrouding, burial and burial of the miscarriage. The mother also created many provisions such as her legal status such as nifas, talaq and ummu'l-veled, punishment lessons such as abortion and gurra, financial concepts such as heir and inheritance, and its effects on conditional contracts. In our study, in the event that the fetus dies due to the cell in the womb where the study medical information is located, the protections against it and the judgment it gives birth to in relation to it are discussed. (shrink)

Foucault and modern medicineModernity as a concept or ideal, resulting from the age of Enlightenment and the French Revolution gave hope of a better future and new possibilities. To be modern means an ‘enlightened’ individual and society, welcoming change and development. In this paper, I will discuss Foucault's analysis (1973) of problematics in medicine in eighteenth century France. Three themes prominent in the text are: ‘the birth of the clinic’, ‘the clinical gaze’ and the power‐knowledge relationship. Three (...) problematics identified in modern medicine by Foucault and which are particularly relevant to twentieth century medicine are: (i) the extension of the clinical gaze from the individual body to the wider population; (ii) the increasing medical intervention and use of technology in fundamental life processes; and (iii) the relationship between society and medicine. I will argue that Foucault's analysis is fraught with ambiguities. It is useful, however, for establishing an explanation for medicine today and for presenting a particular interpretation of modernity. (shrink)

Exploring the philosophical foundation of modern medicine this book explains why it possesses the characteristics it does, accounting for both its strengths as well as its weaknesses.

The moral dilemmas raised by modern medicine are no longer the concerns of doctors alone, but are the subject of intense public debate. Test-tube babies, the mechanical prolongation of life, the prescription of contraceptive pills to underage girls, the nontreatment of handicapped newborns--these issues generate widespread discussion throughout society. In this book, well-known experts address these concerns from philosophical, medical, and legal points of view. Clearly written and thought-provoking, these essays will contribute to the understanding of contemporary moral (...) thinking and medical practice, and will inform public debate. (shrink)

Christianity and Modern Medicine raises moral questions that were merely hypothetical just decades ago. Moreover, traditional moral models are incessantly challenged by the medical community at large, shifting the conversation to patient and societal rights within a framework of moral relativism and rendering the decision-making process morally vague and confusing. In Christianity and Modern Medicine, bioethicist Mark Wesley Foreman and attorney Lindsay C. Leonard delve into the major ethical issues facing today's medical professionals with the purpose (...) of providing principles and guidelines for making critical ethical decisions where medical knowledge, technologies, and capabilities are constantly evolving. Topics covered include: procreational ethics, genetic ethics, abortion, medical research, infanticide, clinical ethics, physician-assisted suicide, legal issues. While Christianity and Modern Medicine is designed specifically for students planning careers in the medical field, it is accessible to any Christian interested in steering through the moral fog in the practice of medicine today. (shrink)

Stethoscopes, x-rays and other medical technologies are two-edged swords. They make medical treatment and diagnosis more accurate and effective, but do at the same time reveal our perceptual inadequacy. By transcending our senses, these technologies reveal that we can be seriously diseased without experiencing any symptoms at all. This situation has changed our attitude towards our relations and ourselves. The situation can be analysed using Jürgen Habermas’ conception of systems colonisation of the lifeworld. Medical technologies colonise our life world. They (...) change the way we think and act. They make us all accept that we can become patients almost any minute, even if we feel perfectly healthy. Sense transcending technologies turn us all into proto-patient. (shrink)

Machine generated contents note: CHAPTER 1 HEALTH CARE PROFESSIONALS AND HIV: The Duty To WarnI -- CHAPTER 2 EMERGENCY CARE AND HIV: Treatment Policy and -- Pracice17 -- CHAPTER 3 A REVOLUTIONARY POLICY? Mandatory Disclosure of HIV -- Serostaus29 -- CHAPTER 4 MINORS AND HEALTH CARE: The Limits of Consent and -- Confidentiality39 -- CHAPTER 5 THE RIGHTS TO REFUSE AND DEMAND MEDICAL -- TREATMENT: The Bounds ofAutonomy andFutli{y47 -- CHAPTER 6 RELIGIOUS FREEDOM AND THE RIGHT TO REFUSE CARE: -- (...) What Are The Limits?65 -- CHAPTER 7 ASSISTED REPRODUCTIVE TECHNOLOGY: The Business of -- Making Babies 89 -- CHAPTER 8 TWINS AND TRANSPLANTS: Choosing Who Lives 113 -- CHAPTER 9 FREE ABORTION SERVICES AND FETAL TISSUE RESEARCH: -- Freedom of Choice and Coercion123 -- CHAPTER 10 PROPERTY RIGHTS, BODY PARTS, AND REPRODUCTION: -- Who Owns the Human Body? - 139 -- CHAPTER 11 OUTBREAK IN AMERICA: The Policy of Public Verses Private -- Interests 153 -- APPENDIX A CONFIDENTIALITY OF HIV TEST RESULTS: California Health -- and Safety Code Sections 120975 Through 121020169 -- APPENDIX B HEALTH CARE PROFESSIONALS AND HIV: Texas Health and -- Safety Code Section 58.204 175 -- APPENDIX C TARASOFF v, THE REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF -- CALIFORNIA: Supreme Court of California177 -- APPENDIX D THE RIGHTS OF MINORS TO CONSENT TO HEALTH CARE: -- California Family Code Sections 6903 Through 6929183 -- APPENDIX E FEDERAL DRUG AND ALCOHOL ABUSE CONFIDENTIALITY -- REGULATIONS: Title 42 Code of Federal Regulations Part 2 187 -- APPENDIX F CHILD ABUSE REPORTING LAWS: Caitfornia Penal Code -- Sections 11164 Through 11166 193. (shrink)

Proposes a radically reconfigured medical model centered on mind-body interaction.

In Norway, by tradition a Lutheran country, the puritan ethics of a moral minority has a strong influence on the development and manifestations of medical ethics. Those who exert this influence are found primarily among politicians, the clergy, and, last but certainly not least, among nurses and doctors. The focus of interest is not so much on problems of bioethical moral theory or the teaching of bioethics to students, but very much on attitudes and policies with regard to substantive issues (...) traditionally regarded in Norway as burning bioethical issues, such as: medical research ethics, abortion, prenatal diagnosis, euthanasia, definitions of death, and reproductive technologies. (shrink)

With contributions from psychiatry, psychology, neuroscience, and philosophy, this book provides the most comprehensive account to date of the interplay between biological, psychological, and social factors in mental health and their ethical dimensions.

Robert Veatch has claimed that virtue theory is not only irrelevant but potentially dangerous in medical ethics. I argue that virtue is a far more prominent factor in contemporary medical practice than Veatch admits. Even if ‘stranger medicine’ is taken as the norm, proper conduct on the part of physicians depends on certain character traits in order to be maintained consistently over a long period of time and in situations which run counter to the physician's own interests. Right conduct, (...) which Veatch argues is the central moral issue in the physician-patient relationship, is intertwined with certain virtues. Moreover, the virtue of integrity and the concept of a unified lifenarrative are especially useful in analyzing an important factor missing in modern medicine. And since medicine relies necessarily on some concept of human flourishing I argue that virtue theory can play a central role in helping to determine the goals of medical practice. Keywords: virtue, right conduct, character, competence, life-narrative, specialization, human flourishing CiteULike Connotea Del.icio.us What's this? (shrink)

In this book the author explores the shifting philosophical boundaries of modern medical knowledge and practice occasioned by the crisis of quality-of-care, especially in terms of the various humanistic adjustments to the biomedical model.

Summary The genealogy of observation as a philosophical term goes back to the ancient Greek astronomical and medical traditions, and the revival of the concept in the Renaissance also happened in the astronomical and medical context. This essay focuses primarily on the medical genealogy of the concept of observation. In ancient Greek culture, an elaboration of the concept of observation (tērēsis) first emerged in the Hellenistic age with the medical sect of the Empirics, to be further developed by the ancient (...) Sceptics. Basically unknown in the Middle Ages, the Empirics’ conceptualisation of tērēsis trickled back into Western medicine in the fourteenth century, but its meaning seems to have been fully recovered by European scholars only in the 1560s, concomitantly with the first Latin translation of the works of Sextus Empiricus. As a category originally associated with medical Scepticism, observatio was a new entry in early modern philosophy. Although the term gained wide currency in general scholarly usage in the seventeenth century, its assimilation into standard philosophical language was very slow. In fact, observatio does not even appear as an entry in the philosophical dictionaries until the eighteenth century—with one significant exception, the medical lexica, which featured the lemma, reporting its ancient Empiric definition, as early as 1564. (shrink)

Up to now neither the question, whether all theoretical medical knowledge can at least be described as scientific, nor the one how exactly access to the existing scientific and theoretical medical knowledge during clinical problem-solving is made, has been sufficiently answered. Scientific theories play an important role in controlling clinical practice and improving the quality of clinical care in modern medicine on the one hand, and making it vindicable on the other. Therefore, the vagueness of unexplicit interrelations between (...) medicine''s stock of knowledge and medical practice appears as a gap in the theoretical concept of modern medicine which can be described as Hiatus theoreticus in the anatomy of medicine. A central intention of the paper is to analyze the role of philosophy of medicine for the clarification of the theoretical basis of medical practice. Clinical relevance and normativity in the sense of modern theory of science are suggested as criteria to establish a differentiation between philosophy of medicine as a primary medical discipline and the application of general philosophy in medicine. (shrink)

Book reviewed in this article: To Do No Harm: DES and the Dilemmas of Modern Medicine. By Roberta J. Apfel and Susan M. Fisher.

This book presents five controversial issues that stir conflicts about moral decisions in our time. John Chirban draws upon resources of specific faith traditions. He provides case discussion and considers numerous interdisciplinary perspectives, arguing an interdependent approach for addressing these current ethical issues.

This article explores enchantment, disenchantment, and re-enchantment in reference to modern medicine’s view of the body. Before considering Weber’s enchantment paradigm, I question some core assumptions regarding sociology as methodologically scientific and value-free. Furthermore, I draw on Jenkins who helps to illustrate the difficulty of rooting terms such as enchantment, disenchantment, and re-enchantment; the question remains “which” historical and cultural period is employed as the basis for such sociological terms. Such questions are critical, but not entirely dismissive of (...) modern medicine as “disenchanted”; with some more explicit foundational and presuppositional context, disenchantment can be a helpful notion for approaching questions of the “new body.” St. Gregory Palamas’ Christian materialism and mystical anthropology present such an explicit foundation. Moreover, this Patristic foundation moves past the postmodern aporia of emphasizing either immanence or transcendence—two polar attractions that factor heavily in the way modern medicine views the body. (shrink)