Bioethical blind spots: four flaws in the field of view of traditional bioethics.
In this paper it is argued that bioethics has tended to emphasise: 'high tech' areas of medicine at the expense of 'low tech' areas such as psychiatry; problems arising in treatment at the expense of those associated with diagnosis; questions of fact at the expense of questions of value; and applied ethics at the expense of philosophical theory. The common factor linking these four 'bioethical blind spots' is a failure to recognise the full extent to which medicine is an ethical as well as scientific discipline. Once this is acknowledged it leads to a full-field bioethics in which the different areas are mutually complementary. In particular, it paves the way for a fruitful two-way exchange between the more abstract aspects of philosophical theory and the contingencies of day-to-day clinical work. The arguments of the paper are illustrated with recent work on the abuse of psychiatry.
Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford, UK.
K W
KW
Fulford
D026688:Bioethical Issues; D028663:Ethical Theory; D026690:Ethics, Clinical; D004992:Ethics, Medical; D006801:Humans; D001523:Mental Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000628:therapy; D028642:Persons with Psychiatric Disorders; D026684:Personal Autonomy; D010686:Philosophy, Medical; D028743:Professional Misconduct; D011570:Psychiatry / Q000592:standards; D012945:Social Values; D013675:Technology, High-Cost