Ethics talk; talking ethics: An example of clinical ethics consultation

Human Studies

Volumn 22, Issue 1, 1999, Pages 7-24

  Bliton, Mark J ^a  

^a VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 8744285853     PISSN: 01638548     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1023/A:1005452517327     Document Type: Article

References (2)

1. During the course of my clinical work, I have been privileged to participate in some of the most intimate, and gravest, passages that individuals experience. The written account provided here is accurate in its core ethical, medical, and human dimensions. To achieve that accuracy, as much as possible I have stayed with the tenor of my notes from the time of consultation. However, out of respect for the privacy and confidentiality of the persons involved I have altered all identifying information so that they cannot be recognized. In this manner, I have traced the moments of this encounter, all the while acknowledging that I can hardly discursively account for the situation for its own sake, except in rudimentary ways that, ineluctably, do violence to the textures and nuances crucial to some sustained understanding for the sake of the individuals involved - which is the exact sort of thing that the writing attempts to elicit. In that regard, I trust, we go beyond ourselves in our actions, and in that "going beyond," as Merleau-Ponty suggests, "each of our perceptions is an act of faith in that it affirms more that we strictly know" ([1964] Sense and Non-Sense, tran. H.L. Dreyfus and P.A. Dreyfus. Evanston: Northwestern University Press: 179). Thus, without pretending that this account will adequately describe the complexity of its source, it nonetheless exemplifies important facets of clinical ethics consultations.
2. Fritjof Capra and David Steindl-Rast with Thomas Matus, Belonging to the Universe: Exploration on the Frontiers of Science and Spirituality (Harper: San Francisco, 1991).