Question

Over the next couple of weeks, you are asked to write a 700-900 word essay on a biomedical ethics subject or event of your choosing, which in some way relates to one or more of the materials we have so far studied. It can be from your chosen course of study, an area of interest you have, or an experience you went through as a patient or caregiver. You will not be given a written assignment for the next two weeks to allow you the full week to focus exclusively on this, though will be asked to read two articles on the ethics of pharmaceutical medicine, which is one of the topics you may choose for your paper.

The point of this short paper is to create an argument about the ethical significance of the subject or experience you are writing about, a significance that is informed by your study in our class so far.

Your argument should have a clear thesis statement (a sample thesis about a biomedical ethical subject might look like, "because nursing is a field dominated by women, many patients expect a style of care from them that corresponds with the patient's gender expectation of women rather than what nurses are medically responsible to perform." NOTE: I MADE THIS THESIS UP, as an example of the form a thesis might take). That thesis statement should then be supported by a few subpoints (3 or 4 , no more, that are explained in a paragraph or so. It should also contain a conclusion that offers fresh insight into the subject you have chosen to discuss.

Use APA format in writing this (you can find a style guide for APA here (Links to an external site.)).

Answer 1

The principles of biomedical ethics – autonomy, non-maleficence, beneficence, and justice – are of paradigmatic importance for framing ethical problems in medicine and for teaching ethics to medical students and professionals. In order to underline this significance, Tom L. Beauchamp and James F. Childress base the principles in the common morality, i.e. they claim that the principles represent basic moral values shared by all persons committed to morality and are thus grounded in human moral psychology. We empirically investigated the relationship of the principles to other moral and non-moral values that provide orientations in medicine. By way of comparison, we performed a similar analysis for the business & finance domain.

Methods

We evaluated the perceived degree of “morality” of 14 values relevant to medicine (n₁ = 317, students and professionals) and 14 values relevant to business & finance (n₂ = 247, students and professionals). Ratings were made along four dimensions intended to characterize different aspects of morality.

Results

We found that compared to other values, the principles-related values received lower ratings across several dimensions that characterize morality. By interpreting our finding using a clustering and a network analysis approach, we suggest that the principles can be understood as “bridge values” that are connected both to moral and non-moral aspects of ethical dilemmas in medicine. We also found that the social domain (medicine vs. business & finance) influences the degree of perceived morality of values.

Conclusions

Our results are in conflict with the common morality hypothesis of Beauchamp and Childress, which would imply domain-independent high morality ratings of the principles. Our findings support the suggestions by other scholars that the principles of biomedical ethics serve primarily as instruments in deliberated justifications, but lack grounding in a universal “common morality”. We propose that the specific manner in which the principles are taught and discussed in medicine – namely by referring to conflicts requiring a balancing of principles – may partly explain why the degree of perceived “morality” of the principles is lower compared to other moral values.