Healthcare Ethics Biomedical ethics (essay) Mudr. Kseniia Vykhrystenko M20886 - FAM 2021 2ETZE Biomedical ethics is the professional ethics of all who work in medicine and health care. Biomedical ethics studies the relationships between people in the healthcare system, as well as the system of norms, values and obligations, which a doctor accepts and implements by providing assistance to a sick person. Studies of the value consciousness of different cultural communities show that there is a fundamental unity of the main moral values of humanity, and the diversity of cultures affects differences only in detail. According to current research, “individuals and cultures do not differ very deeply in what they regard as finite ethical values.” This was also confirmed by a fundamental study of the Council of Europe, which made recommendations on bioethics. It resulted in a collection of norms and rules of international law, ethics, Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Muslim and Buddhist morality the book “Medicine and Human Rights” (1992). This publication demonstrates the common approaches of the countries of Central and Eastern Europe to ethical problems of medicine and health. Eternal ethical values include: mercy, care, justice, compassion, and saving lives. It is these values that define professional medical morality. Regardless of the continent in which the doctor works or the country in which the patient lives, despite the existing temporal and spatial boundaries, despite the cultural-national differences between people, the values of life and mercy are accepted by all doctors and patients. That is why biomedical ethics is not a kind of independent education, but a form of applied ethics, which is characterized by the application, the use of classical normative-ethical theories to practical moral problems of medicine and health. Throughout the history of medicine, the important task of professional ethics doc-tors saw in the ability to implement and apply moral values in specific medical practice. This is how the concepts of “moral norms” and “moral principles” appear. Having tested their regulatory power in practice, the medical community considered it necessary to formulate periodically on the basis of them the duties of a doc-tor and recommendations for their execution. Thus, biomedical ethics is applied ethics, which on the basis of moral principles solves the problem of establishing such relations with the patient, which would ensure faith in treatment, trust in the doctor of the patient and society. Practical attitude of a doctor to a patient and a healthy person, initially focused on care, assistance, support, is certainly the main feature of the medical profession. Hippocrates rightly pointed out the direct dependence between humanitarianism and the efficiency of professional medical activity. Human love not only serves as a fundamental criterion for choosing a profession, but also directly affects the success of treatment, largely determining the measure of medical art. “Where love for people,” wrote Hippocrates, “there is love for his art.” The ability to subordinate themselves to the interests of the patient, mercy and dedication — is not only and not just deserving of respect for the qualities of the doctor, but a testimony of his professionalism. The principles of professional medical ethics, formulated by Hippocrates, differed significantly from the influential in the ancient culture of moral customs, which cultivated the natural properties and individual needs of man. The peculiarities of the moral behavior of the physician Hippocrates saw first of all that it should not be oriented on the personal individual good and the search for ways of achieving this good (material, sensual, etc.). The doctor’s activity, both in terms of his inner aspirations and in terms of his external actions, should be motivated by the interests and good of the patient. “Wherever I enter, I shall enter for the benefit of the sick, far from all that is deliberate, unrighteous, and pernicious,” Hippocrates wrote. The differences between the moral rules of the doctor and the daily practice of human relations remain today. One of the objectives of biomedical ethics is to ex-plain and substantiate why these rules are given the status of basic rules, what is the nature of these rules and why they are obligatory. Thus, the subject of biomedical ethics is the system of moral relations between the subjects of medical activity in the relationship “doctor — patient”, “doctor — doctor”, “doctor — society”, including the internal moral self-assessment of the doctor, i.e. the relationship “I — I”. The rules of biomedical ethics should include: the rule of confidentiality, the rule of truthfulness, the rule of free informed consent. These rules, in their current con-tent, complement and specify the principle of respect for the autonomy of the patient. Confidentiality in medicine is a requirement for doctors and medical staff to keep the patient confidential. The medical mystery has existed since ancient times. The patient entrusted the doc- tor with all the necessary information about himself, and the doctor guaranteed its preservation. Back in ancient India was born aphorism: “You can not trust your brother, mother, friend, but you must trust your doctor always”. Patients began to hide or even distort information about themselves, which is always necessary for diagnosis and treatment, and in some cases plays a decisive role. In general, the atmosphere of warm, trusting relations between the doctor and the patient, which, among other things, has a huge psychotherapeutic effect, has disappeared. For the doctor to be able to give more help and make a correct diagnosis — you do not need to hide anything and tell about your condition for longer. The very fact of going to the clinic is a medical secret. Morality and law guard confidentiality, and that is the great meaning of life. The patient must make sure that the data on his condition or illness stop within the clinic. Every time a doctor violates confidentiality, he must ask himself on what grounds he is doing so. Disclosure of medical secrecy undermined the professional authority of the doctor, his moral image and legally punishable. The rule of truthfulness is the right of a patient to objective information about his health condition. Today, the patient can always ask the doctor for complete information about the state of health. Until the rule and the corresponding law had arisen, medical secrecy had been ex- tended to the sick, and truthfulness to his relatives, that is, they had been told the whole truth, even the bitterest, and the sick had been told only what the doctor thought fit. Now — all on the contrary. And the doctor should respect his request. Of course, he must warn the patient of possible dangers for him and others, if any. It is here that the moral and psychological literacy of the doctor, his professional experience is manifested: not to lie, but to avoid jatrogii. Moral responsibility for the correct understanding of the information provided to the patient lies with the doctor. The patient should ask the doctor to disclose: — meaning and meaning of action; — its necessity; – Expected results; — possible consequences; – health risk; – Consequences of non-intervention; — possible alternatives. Ask your doctor to announce all possible treatments to choose the optimal one. 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