Medical Ethics in Everyday Clinical Practice

It's interesting to read that medical ethics and law can be studied at a post-graduate level in the form of a masters degree. Ethical situations are encountered frequently in everyday practice however the demands of busy hospital workloads mean that often ethical situations are overlooked. I remember in 5th year when we were choosing a topic for our ethics essays, people would often email the professor in medical ethics at Dundee, saying that they couldn't find an ethical dilemma which they had encountered which would be suitable for an essay. She emailed all of the 5th year students to say that this was 'nonsense' and that ethical dilemmas are encountered everyday. Courses in medical ethics tend to focus around big moral questions, such as euthanasia, but an example of everyday ethics would include, for example, responding to competing demands by prioritising, and speaking to families who are frightened or angry. It is important to recognise that, the same way confidence and expertise in other aspects of medicine develops with practice and experience, so does ethical awareness. The University of Edinburgh offers a distance learning course in medical ethics which looks interesting.

Other articles in the BMJ which I've been reading this week:

Illegally produced alcohol - In the UK there are increasing amounts of illegally produced alcohol entering the market. In a society which consumes alcohol as heavily as our own in Scotland, it is hard to know how much could be produced illegally. The potential health hazards are very serious. The different categories include counterfeit alcohol designed to look like 'the real thing'. There is also homemade spirits imported from Europe, and then there is the consumption of other industrially produced chemicals, such as ethanol (which can lead to blindness).

How can we treat multiple chronic conditions? - An article written by the associate editor of the BMJ relating to the difficulty of treating multiple chronic conditions. Chronic illnesses are much more common now that acute illnesses and with people living for many years, there are often multiple co-morbidities. In fact it is rare these days to see a medical admission without something in the 'past-medical-history' section. But how do we treat patients with multiple co-morbidities? Guidelines for practitioners on this topic is thin on the ground but apparently it is a rapidly expanding area of research.