Ethics and Health Care: An Introduction

by John Moskop

Who should have access to assisted reproductive technologies? Which one of many seriously ill patients should be offered the next available transplant organ? When may a surrogate decision maker decide to withdraw life-prolonging measures from an unconscious patient? Questions like these feature prominently in the field of health care ethics and in the education of health care professionals. This book provides a concise introduction to the major concepts, principles and issues in health care ethics, using case studies throughout to illustrate and analyse challenging ethical issues in contemporary health care. Topics range widely, from confidentiality and truthfulness to end-of-life care and research on human subjects. Ethics and Health Care will be a vital resource for students of applied ethics, bioethics, professional ethics, health law and medical sociology, as well as students of medicine, nursing and other health care professions.

390 pages, Paperback

First published February 29, 2016

Reviews

[Erin Mc · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lucid and concise introduction to ethical principles as they commonly apply to medicine. The author's writing is unencumbered by the tangents, rabbit holes, and speculation that impede the extraction of basic principles from similar introductory texts. The illustrative cases the author chooses provide adequate fuel for discussion without overwhelming the reader with detail.
The only reason this earns 4 and not 5 stars from me is that its clarity came sometimes at the expense of obscuring the nuance and complexity presented by the issues it discussed. The section on maternal-fetal conflict seemed especially oversimplified. Otherwise, a fantastic starting point for students and clinicians to begin to explore medical ethics.

[Deanna · Rating 4 out of 5]

When people ask what I want to do for a living I will just hand them this book and say “I wanna help hospitals answer the big questions raised in this book.” Dr. Moskop is awesome. Great overview of bioethics.