About a presentation at the Oxford Global Health and Bioethics International Conference, July 2025: Who is the "owner" of Bioethics?

Although it want to be a provocative question to foster debate, the complexity of moral dilemmas in health and life sciences deserves it... 

Do you agree? 

At the same time we need to identify the different actors and stakeholders and in this regards 

 

Ho do we imagine learning in the future: an scenario of volatility, uncertainty. complexity and ambiguity

Interesting thoughts displayed in this VIDEO from Nick Burnett who explores different challenges of learning in the future. 

Is Bioethics under the same paradigm?

 

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Teaching "Professionalism": a matter of Bioethics?

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Microsoft Office 

For many years and still continues Bioethics debates whether or not the issue of "professionalism" is within its competence.

 Beyond this, it is important to bring it into the arena of debate and especially analyze its relevance for the training of health professionals in the early years of their careers (but not only).

Professionalism is an integral component and goal of medical schools and residency education. Over the past 13 years, the "Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC), the Liaison Committee on Medical Education (LCME), and the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) have spearheaded educational reform in professionalism"*.

Medical ethics and humanities curricula should incorporate assessable goals of medical education that promote the continuous development of professionalism in the physician’s lifelong learning, according with Doukas, David J., et al (2013)*

The authors recommend that such teaching should have five components: 

1. An effective medical ethics and humanities curriculum builds on what students bring to medical school, especially their prior studies in humanities, informed by work in the social and behavioral sciences.
2. The goals and outcomes of medical ethics and humanities teaching should emphasize professionalism by explicitly linking educational outcomes to the general competencies, especially professionalism
3. Medical ethics and humanities education should synchronize with what students are learning in the basic and clinical sciences and with what residents are learning in their rotations. 
4. Teaching must be assessable for its ability to promote professionalism. 
5. Medical ethics and humanities teaching materials need to be readily understandable and relevant for the learner in order to promote professionalism education.

I would also add the importance for each professional of examining their competences and their own practices as it relates to professionalism and that this review should frequently be considered within the framework of "Life Long Learning". 

Likewise, that professionalism should not only be a question of initiative as it was raised by C. E. VanZANDT (1990). 

What steps in this direction are your Universities and Academic Centers taking and is professionalism training a common practice?

Best and thanks in advance, 

Irene M

*Doukas, David J., et al. "The challenge of promoting professionalism through medical ethics and humanities education." Academic Medicine 88.11 (2013): 1624-1629.

Emergency remote teaching or effective on line education?

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In contrast to experiences that are planned from the beginning and designed to be online, emergency remote teaching (ERT) Charles Hodges, et al (2020) is a temporary shift of instructional delivery to an alternate delivery mode due to crisis circumstances.

Based on this numerous research studies, theories, models, standards, and evaluation criteria focus on quality online learning, online teaching, and online course design. What it is known from research is that effective online learning results from careful instructional design and planning, using a systematic model for design and development,

As Charles Hodges et al (2020) considers the "need to "just get it online" is in direct contradiction to the time and effort normally dedicated to developing a quality course. Online courses created in this way should not be mistaken for long-term solutions but accepted as a temporary solution to an immediate problem". 

Do you agree? What is your experience in this topic? Comments are welcome!!