2009, Vol.12, No.3

Korean Journal of Medical Ethics 2023 KCI Impact Factor : 1.21

pISSN : 2005-8284 / eISSN : 2234-3598
https://journal.kci.go.kr/medethics

Medical ethics, which is expanding in scope, now includes public health ethics, bioethics, and biomedical or health care ethics. Though it started as a form of professional ethics, medical ethics is one of the most important fields of practical ethics, a branch of philosophy. According to Rawls, much of moral theory is independent from the other parts of philosophy. That is, the study of moral concepts and their relation to our moral sensibility has its own distinctive problems and subject matter, requiring unique forms of study. But what is the relation between ethics and medical ethics? In this article we argue that moral theory and medical ethics are necessarily interconnected and that they support each other. Professional duties are influenced by health care systems and policies, and public health ethics is influenced by ethical and political theory. Therefore, we argue that problems in medical ethics should be addressed from a meta-viewpoint that takes other disciplines into consideration.

In 2007, the Korean Society for Medical Ethics Education and the Korean Academy of Medical Sciences published “The Educational Goals of Ethics Programs for Medical Trainees,” which presents 47 case reports and related discussions. Although the legal and medical responsibilities of medical professionals are closely related, they can often be distinguished. Therefore, in omitting some of the legal aspects of the case reports, the aforementioned publication fails to guide trainees in how to deal with issues similar to those raised in the case reports. The present article examines the legal responsibilities of the doctors described in those case reports. The result shows that the publication discusses the legal responsibilities of doctors in only nine of 31 relevant cases. We argue that the ethical and legal responsibilities of medical professionals need to be taught in an integrative manner. Furthermore, we claim that the legal aspects of medical case reports must be studied with the help of legal professionals and should be reflected in publications used to train medical professionals.

In today’s rapidly changing and technologically sophisticated health-care environment, nurses frequently encounter ethical issues in caring for patients. While ethical values have always been a part of nursing education, the resources needed for ethics education have not always been readily available to nursing students and practicing nurses. This review aims to describe the state of nursing ethics education in Korea and provide insights into its requirements and priorities. In order to train nurses to participate in ethical decision making, more contemporary models of ethics education are being implemented in nursing programs. It is important for nurse educators to understand that ethics education should provide students with ways of conceptualizing ethical dilemmas and arriving at practical solutions. Furthermore, we argue that there is a need to develop Web-based continuing-education courses to enhance nurses’ ethical decision-making and advocacy roles.