Health Care Ethics: A Catholic Theological Analysis

by Benedict M. Ashley

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Summary

Health Care Ethics is a comprehensive study of significant issues affecting health care and the ethics of health care from the perspective of Catholic theology. It aims to help Christian, and especially Catholic, health care professionals solve concrete problems in terms of principles rooted in scripture and tested by individual experience; however, its basis in real medical experience makes this book a valuable resource for anyone with a general interest in health care ethics.

This fifth edition, which includes important contributions by Jean deBlois, C.S.J., considers everyday ethical questions and dilemmas in clinical care and deals more deeply with issues of women's health, mental health, sexual orientation, artificial reproduction, and the new social issues in health care. The authors devote special attention to the various ethical theories currently in use in the United States while clearly presenting a method of ethical decision making based in the Catholic tradition. They discuss the needs of the human person, outlining what it means to be human, both as an individual and as part of a community.

This volume has been significantly updated to include new discussions of recent clinical innovations and theoretical issues that have arisen in the field:

the Human Genome Project
efforts to control sexual selection of infants
efforts to genetically modify the human genotype and phenotype
the development of palliative care as a medical specialty
the acceptance of non-heart beating persons as organ donors
embryo development and stem cell research
reconstructive and cosmetic surgery
nutrition and obesity
medical mistakes
the negative effects of managed care on the patient-physician relationship
recent papal allocution regarding care of patients in a persistent vegetative state and palliative care for dying patients

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