Suffering and the moral orientation of presence: lessons from Nazi medicine for the contemporary medical trainee

2020 ◽  
pp. medethics-2020-106061
Author(s):  
Benjamin Wade Frush ◽  
Jay R Malone
Keyword(s):  
Medical Practice ◽  
Moral Orientation ◽  
Medical Trainee ◽  
Stanley Hauerwas ◽  
Medical Trainees ◽  
Moral Orientations ◽  
Nazi Medicine ◽  
Contemporary Practice ◽  
Nazi Physicians

Medical trainees should learn from the actions of Nazi physicians to inform a more just contemporary practice by examining the subtle assumptions, or moral orientations, that led to such heinous actions. One important moral orientation that still informs contemporary medical practice is the moral orientation of elimination in response to suffering patients. We propose that the moral orientation of presence, described by theologian Stanley Hauerwas, provides a more fitting response to suffering patients, in spite of the significant barriers to enacting such a moral orientation for contemporary trainees.

Caring about Injustice: The Moral Self-Perceptions of Professional Female Bodybuilders

2000 ◽  
Vol 22 (4) ◽  
pp. 327-344 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leslee A. Fisher ◽  
Brenda J.L. Bredemeier
Keyword(s):  
Moral Dilemmas ◽  
Moral Orientation ◽  
Social Situations ◽  
Self Perceptions ◽  
Study Results ◽  
Moral Orientations ◽  
Justice And Care ◽  
Care And Justice ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Care Reasoning

The purpose of this study was twofold: (a) to investigate the moral orientations of professional female bodybuilders and (b) to explore the relationship between professional female bodybuilders’ moral orientations when reasoning about self-identified and standardized hypothetical (steroid) moral dilemmas. Ten professional female bodybuilders ranging in age from 26 to 40 years participated in the study. Results revealed that female bodybuilders used both justice and care reasoning in their considerations of moral dilemmas encountered in the bodybuilding context; however, one moral orientation predominated over the other for each participant. Although Gilligan and colleagues (Brown et al., 1988) claim that women tend to use predominantly care reasoning, the present study found that half the participants used a justice perspective. Results are discussed in light of Rest’s (Rest, Narvaez, Bebeau, & Thoma, 1999) supposition that care and justice are ideals appropriate to different kinds of social situations and are complementary rather than rival moralities.

The Virtue of Hope in Medical Training

2021 ◽  
pp. 002436392110036
Author(s):  
Benjamin W. Frush ◽  
John Brewer Eberly
Keyword(s):  
Medical Practice ◽  
Medical Training ◽  
General Term ◽  
Medical Practitioners ◽  
Medical Trainees ◽  
Precise Characterization ◽  
Hope Medical

While many of the challenges of contemporary medical training are characterized uniformly as “burnout,” such a diagnosis is nonspecific and overlooks the degree to which the flourishing of medical practitioners depends on the development and exercise of virtue. The virtue of hope, in particular, is indispensable to sound medical practice generally and the flourishing of trainees. It is only through sound apprehension of the nature of the virtue of hope, the challenges to the cultivation of hope that residency poses, and practices that allow such cultivation, that contemporary trainees can learn to care well for patients and flourish in their own right. Summary: While the general term “burnout” is used to describe many of the challenges of contemporary medical training, a more precise characterization that unifies these challenges is a deficiency of the virtue of hope. Medical trainees face many obstacles to the cultivation of hope during training, but learning both to correctly identify this deficiency, and practices which prove a fitting response, offers a way forward.

scholarly journals Semantic, Logical, and Ethical Considerations of Patients’ Decisions in the Resolution of Moral Dilemmas

2020 ◽  
Vol 64 (1) ◽  
pp. 99-123
Author(s):  
Tomasz Rzepiński ◽  
Ewa Baum ◽  
Agnieszka Żok
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Medical Practice ◽  
Moral Dilemma ◽  
Belief System ◽  
Moral Dilemmas ◽  
Moral Orientation ◽  
Ethical Considerations ◽  
First Choice ◽  
Decision Making Processes

AbstractDecision-making procedures in medical practice are often analysed by both philosophers of science and ethicists, as well as statisticians, clinicians and methodologists. The paper focuses on decisions made by patients in situations of moral dilemma. The main purpose is to analyse the strategies used in resolving such dilemmas. First, the concept of a ‘situation of moral dilemma’ is clarified. Then, two types of strategies for resolving such situations are distinguished. The first strategy requires revising the patient’s belief system or moral orientation. The second one includes a group of non-revision beliefs strategies (NRB). The authors argue in support of the thesis that NRB strategies are, in fact, the patient’s first choice when it comes to resolving moral dilemmas. The paper analyses situations where the NRB strategies may prove effective, as well as situations where they fail and where the solution of the moral dilemma must be addressed by revising the accepted belief system. The findings will help to better understand patients’ decision-making processes.

scholarly journals Suffering Absence: Hauerwas and the Challenges to Faithful Presence in Contemporary Medical Training

2020 ◽  
Vol 87 (4) ◽  
pp. 464-470
Author(s):  
Benjamin W. Frush
Keyword(s):  
Medical Training ◽  
Moral Community ◽  
Moral Commitment ◽  
Medical Trainee ◽  
Stanley Hauerwas ◽  
Moral Communities

In this essay, the author draws on the theologian Stanley Hauerwas’ work to describe the central challenge of the contemporary medical trainee as an inability to be present to suffering patients. While the central challenge to the physician was once the moral resources required for such presence, today it is the temporal and bureaucratic demands bearing upon the contemporary resident preclude even the opportunity for this presence. In order to seek out such spaces when time does become available, the contemporary trainee requires a moral community, as Hauerwas notes “like a church,” to remind him or her of the moral commitment to be present to suffering patients even in the midst of such structural challenges. Summary: Contemporary residents must actively seek out the opportunity to be present to suffering patients and require moral communities to sustain this commitment.

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