Required Text:
Munson, Ronald.  Intervention and Reflection: Basic Issues in Medical Ethics.  Fifth Edition.  New York: Wadsworth, 1996.

Course Goals:
This course is designed to introduce you to some of the central issues of medical ethics.  Ethics addresses questions such as ‘How should I act?,’ ‘How do I decide whether one way I could act is morally better than some other way?,’ and ‘Are different ethical systems equally acceptable, or are some people's values just wrong?’  Medical ethics addresses these questions in the context of patient care and the distribution of medical attention, and seeks to determine which actions or options in medical practice are obligatory, which permissible, and which impermissible.  By the end of the course you should be familiar with the major ethical theories relevant to medical practice, and be able to apply these theories to ethical issues.

We will address several topics specific to medical ethics, including terminating impaired infants, the distribution of limited medical resources, and genetic engineering.  Special attention will be paid to the ethical aspects of the most common interactions between patients and healthcare providers.

Required work:

• Attend and participate in all class meetings
• Read assignments from the text before each class meeting
• Contribute to one in-class group presentation
• Write one brief (1-3 page) position paper on the topic of one of the in-class presentations
• Take one midterm examination and one final examination