By Zeynep Sude Yeşildağ and Şəfiqə Süleymanova Antibiotics are among the most significant advances in modern medicine, transforming once-fatal infections into easily treatable conditions. Yet this success has a fragile side. When antibiotics are used casually, without proper indication or supervision, the very tools designed to save lives begin to lose their effectiveness. What was once […]
Category: Medical ethics
“One problem per appointment?” Why setting limits can both fairer and safer
By Dr. Richard Armitage As a GP, I rarely see a single-issue consultation. One person comes with a sore throat, a bad back, and queries about their medications. Another comes with a headache, low mood, and wanting the results of a recent blood test. This is the nature of routine primary care. But it creates […]
What Does It Mean to Provide Medicine in a World of Declining Trust?
By Crystal Lemus What does it really mean to “provide medicine”? For many, the image is clinical—white coats, prescription pads, MRI scans, and protocols. But at its philosophical core, medicine is a moral act: one human being entering into the vulnerability of another. The practice of medicine is rooted in a complex interplay between trust, […]
The Fence Around Us: How India’s Medical System Enables Cultural Misogyny
By Anonymous* A baby girl starved to death in a South Indian hospital. No one was held accountable. I first heard about her during a forensic medicine lecture on starvation. The regular faculty were away, so a professor from a different specialty stepped in. As she listed various types of starvation, she paused to reflect […]
Meet your new medical ethicist: ChatGPT
By Daniel Sokol In February 2023, I wrote on this forum about a new honesty test for doctors.[1] Developed with an experienced clinical psychologist, the test was a Situational Judgement Test of 22 real-life scenarios involving truth-telling problems. The ‘correct’ answers were determined by six professors of medical ethics who were also medical doctors. To […]
Efficiency and Education: Finding Harmony in AI-Driven Medical Notes
By Trisha Nagin Artificial Intelligence (AI) scribing technology has been praised as a revolutionary tool in modern healthcare. It can be seen as an answer to the long-standing problem of physician burnout caused by documentation. By listening in on doctor-patient conversations and generating clinical notes automatically, the technology is designed to save time, increase efficiency, […]
The doctor will speak as you prefer? How AI could personalize medical communication
By Hazem Zohny, Jemima Winfried Allen, Dominic Wilkinson, and Julian Savulescu. When you go to the doctor, there’s little telling what kind of communicator you’ll get. Some doctors are on the paternalistic side, telling you what you should do without much discussion. Others just give you the facts and leave the decision entirely to you. […]
My digital twin is queer
By Jose Luis Guerrero Quiñones and Anna Puzio. What if we could avoid (at least to some extent) doctors’ appointments? No more waiting times, no more moving around hospital floors. Who wouldn’t be happy to send someone else in their place for certain medical examinations? In the future, instead of undergoing a thorough physical examination, […]
Should virtual assistants be used to help people in vulnerable positions access care?
By Steven R. Kraaijeveld, Hanneke van Heijster, Nadine Bol, and Kris E. Bevelander. The rising costs of health care in Europe and many countries around the world have led to calls to use technology and digitalization to “drive more equitable and sustainable outcome for all”. Digitalizing parts of health care may not only reduce costs, […]
Should liberal states permit the social use of mitochondrial replacement technique? The answer is yes.
By Marco Tang. What is mitochondrial replacement technique (MRT)? It involves obtaining a donor egg, removing the nDNA from the donor egg, transferring the legal mother’s nDNA into the donor egg and fertilizing it with the legal father’s sperm. This procedure enables women with mitochondrial disease to have children without it. What is unique is […]