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| Left to right: Dr. Winslade, Dr. Gomez, Dr. Povar |
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The Department of Medical Humanities and the Bioethics Center have co-sponsored several conferences and workshops over the years. Most of these events have offered continuing education credit for health care professionals. Some recent offerings have included:
Tuesday, March 19, 2002
End-of-Life Care: Emerging Ethical and Clinical Issues
Edwin W. Monroe AHEC Conference Center, Greenville, NC
Overview
End-of-life care has long been a neglected topic in the education of health professionals, and frequently a taboo subject among members of the general public. The ongoing debate over physician-assisted suicide has helped to focus national attention on deficiencies in end-of-life care and to open a dialogue on death and dying. Health care professionals have begun to accept responsibility for improving end-of-life care, but more work needs to be done.
Topics
This conference is designed to examine the central ethical and clinical issues in end-of-life care through lectures, small group presentations, a short film and discussion, and case-based discussions. Conference presentations will address the transition from curative to palliative care; improving death and dying in the hospital; palliative care in pediatrics; African-American experiences and rituals relating to the end of life; pain management; and advance care planning.
Speakers
Outside speakers include David Barnard, Ph.D., Professor of Medicine and Director of Palliative Care Education, Center for Bioethics and Health Law, University of Pittsburgh; Karla F.C. Holloway, Ph.D., William R. Kenan Professor of English and Dean of the Humanities and Social Sciences, Duke University; Susan Redding, R.N., M.S.N., Clinical Nurse Specialist and End-of-Life Coordinator, Pitt Country Memorial Hospital, Greenville, NC; Marsha Rehm, R.N., M.S.N., Oncology Care Facilitator, Pitt County Memorial Hospital, Greenville, NC; and Gwynn B. Sullivan, R.N., M.S.N., Director, North Carolina Community Outreach, The Carolinas Center for Hospice and End-of-Life Care, Cary, NC. Speakers from the Brody School of Medicine include George Ho, M.D., Associate Professor of Internal Medicine; John C. Moskop, Ph.D., Professor of Medical Humanities and Director of the Bioethics Center; Ronald M. Perkin, M.D., M.A., Professor and Chair, Department of Pediatrics; and David B. Resnik, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Medical Humanities and Associate Director of the Bioethics Center.
Friday, March 9, 2001
Information Technology and Health Care: Ethical, Legal, and Social Issues
Brody Auditorium, Brody Medical Sciences Building, Greenville, NC.
Overview
The information revolution is having a tremendous impact on the delivery of health care in the United States. New information technologies, such as personal computers, telemedicine, electronic medical records, the Internet and World Wide Web, and decision support systems are profoundly affecting the way health care professionals and patients gather, store, manage, interpret, and share medical information. While these changes create new opportunities to improve both the quality and efficiency of health care, they raise a variety of ethical, legal, and social issues relating to patient self-determination, patient education, medical confidentiality, personal responsibility, organizational accountability, and the changing role of the health care professional. This conference will examine and discuss these and other issues concerning the relationship between information technology and health care.
The conference is designed to identify and address some of the ethical, legal, and social issues that have arisen as a result of advances in information technology in health care. It will include presentations, followed by question and answer sessions, case-based small group discussions, and a panel discussion. This conference is designed to be of interest to health care professionals and students from a variety of disciplines, including medicine, nursing, health care administration, health education, and health care information management.
Speakers
Conference speakers include David C. Balch, Director, Health Sciences Communication, Brody School of Medicine, East Carolina University; Kenneth A. De Ville, Ph.D., J.D., Associate Professor, Department of Medical Humanities, Brody School of Medicine, East Carolina University; Kenneth W. Goodman, Ph.D., Professor, Department of Philosophy, University of Miami; Deborah G. Johnson, Ph.D., Director, Program in Philosophy, Science, and Technology, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA; Elizabeth J. Laymon, Ph.D., Associate Professor and Chair, Department of Health Information Services, School of Allied Health, East Carolina University; Mary Faith Marshall, Ph.D., Professor, Department of Medicine and Bioethics Officer, University of Kansas Medical Center; Robin Parkin, Director, Medical Information Systems, Pitt County Memorial Hospital, University Health Systems of Eastern Carolina; David B. Resnik, Ph.D. Associate Professor, Department of Medical Humanities, Brody School of Medicine and Associate Director, The Bioethics Center, University Health Systems of Eastern Carolina.
Registration and Credit
Applications will be made for continuing education credit for physicians, nurses, and other health professionals. For more information about the conference or to register, please call (252) 744-5211.
May 18, 2000
ACCESS TO HEALTH CARE: MORAL, POLITICAL, AND CLINICAL CHALLENGES
ABOUT THE CONFERENCE
With the defeat of the Clinton proposal for national health care reform in 1994, the issue of access to health care disappeared for a time from our nation's policy agenda. The problems, however, did not disappear---since 1994, the ranks of those without health insurance in the United States have grown from 35 million to 44 million people, including 11 million children. As the new millennium begins, there are signs of renewed attention to the problem of access. Both Surgeon General David Hatcher and the Department of Human Services' Healthy People 2010 initiative have recently identified improving access to care as a top priority. As in 1992, health care reform may become a major issue in this year's presidential campaign.
Both individual and institutional health care providers confront difficult choices to provide or deny access to health care. These choices are more frequent and more complicated in areas, like eastern North Carolina, with limited health care resources and large indigent populations. This conference will examine the moral, political, and clinical dimensions of access to health care. Conference speakers will discuss moral arguments, political and institutional initiatives, and practical approaches to improving access to health care. Significant time will be earmarked for questions and discussion among conference faculty and audience members.
Support for this conference has been provided by University Health Systems of Eastern Carolina.
CONFERENCE OBJECTIVES
- To identify and evaluate moral arguments for and against societal efforts to improve access to health care
- To review current federal, state, and local initiatives for improving access to health care
- To examine the role of tertiary care centers and regional health systems in addressing access to health care
- To explore reasons for special efforts to address the health care needs of specific populations, especially children, minority groups and undocumented immigrants.
- To appreciate the contributions of and challenges confronting programs and professionals seeking to improve access to health care
SPEAKERS
Larry Churchill, Ph.D., Professor of Social Medicine, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Kenneth A. De Ville, Ph.D., J.D., Associate Professor of Medical Humanities, Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University
Loretta M. Kopelman, Ph.D., Professor and Chair, Department of Medical Humanities, Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University
Willem A. Landman, D.Phil., Professor of Medical Humanities, Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University
Terri Lawler, RN, MPH, Ed.D., Professor Emerita, School of Nursing, East Carolina University; Co-Chair, Access to Care Committee, Pitt Partners for Health
Barbara Matula, MPA, Director of Health Care Programs, North Carolina Medical Society Foundation, Raleigh, NC
John C. Moskop, Ph.D., Professor of Medical Humanities, Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University; Director, Bioethics Center, University Health Systems of Eastern Carolina
David B. Resnik, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Medical Humanities, Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University; Associate Director, Bioethics Center, University Health Systems of Eastern Carolina
December 6, 1999
MORAL CHALLENGES IN RURAL HEALTH CARE
Much of the popular and scholarly interest in bioethics in recent years has focused on high cost, high technology therapies and research interventions like artificial ventilation, organ transplantation, cloning, and gene therapy. As important as these new technologies may be, they are not the most pressing moral issues confronting health care professionals practicing in rural areas like eastern North Carolina. Rural practitioners are much more likely to encounter moral questions in practical, "everyday" situations --- questions of keeping confidentiality, defining professional boundaries, securing care for indigent patients, or accepting leadership responsibilities in the community. These latter questions may, in fact, arise in distinctive ways in rural practice - how, for example, can one separate one's personal and professional relationships when one is the only physician practicing in a rural community?
This conference is designed to identify and address the distinctive moral issues faced by health care professionals and institutions in rural areas. The conference will include presentations followed by question and answer sessions, case-based small group discussions, a panel of regional professionals and a Readers Theater presentation of a short story about rural health. Support for the conference has been provided by the University Health Systems of Eastern Carolina.
Featured speakers:
Judy Bernhardt, R.N., Ph.D., Professor, Department of Community Health Systems, East Carolina University School of Nursing
James Bernstein, Director, North Carolina Office of Research, Demonstration, and Rural Health Development, Raleigh, NC
J. Seaborn Blair, III, M.D., HealthEast Family Care-Hatteras, Hatteras, NC
Jacqueline J. Glover, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Medicine and Pediatrics and Associate Director of the Center for Health, Ethics and Law, West Virginia University; Acting Executive Director, West Virginia Network of Ethics Committees
Thomas G. Irons, M.D., Associate Vice Chancellor for Health Sciences, East Carolina University; President, Health East, Inc.
Larry McAvoy, C.H.E., Chief Executive Officer, Washington County Hospital, Plymouth, NC
Jane H. McCaleb, M.D., Medical Director, Rural Health Group, Inc., Jackson, NC John C. Moskop, Ph.D., Professor of Medical Humanities, East Carolina University School of Medicine; Director, Bioethics Center, University Health Systems of Eastern Carolina
David B. Resnik, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Medical Humanities, East Carolina University School of Medicine; Associate Director, Bioethics Center, University Health Systems of Eastern Carolina
Todd L. Savitt, Ph.D., Professor and Associate Chair, Department of Medical Humanities, East Carolina University School of Medicine
Applications will be made to obtain continuing education credit for medicine, nursing, and nursing home administration as well as ECU Continuing Studies credit.
May 19, 1999
Caring for the Dying Patient
SPEAKERS
Pat Gibbons, R.N., Director of Beacon Place, Hospice at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC
Laura C. Hanson, M.D., M.P.H., Assistant Professor of Medicine, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine
Martha Henderson, R.N., N.P., M.S.N., M.Div., D.Div., Assistant Professor, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Nursing
John Lusk, M.D., Medical Director, Hospice at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC Judi Lund Person, M.P.H., President and Chief Executive Officer, Hospice for the Carolinas, Raleigh, NC
David Resnik, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Medical Humanities, East Carolina University School of Medicine, and Associate Director, The Bioethics Center, University Health Systems of Eastern Carolina
Ken Turner, M.A., Chaplain of Oncology, Pitt County Memorial Hospital
TOPICS
The conference included the following sessions: an overview of care at the end of life, clinical perspectives on end of life care, ethical issues in dying, small group discussions of end of life care, policy issues in end of life care, a panel discussion on spirituality and care for the dying, and a roundtable discussion on care for the dying in eastern North Carolina.
September 15, 1998
Health Care Choices at the End of Life
SPEAKERS
Carlos F. Gomez, M.D., University of Virginia School of Medicine
Gail J. Povar, M.D., M.P.H., George Washington University School of Medicine
William J. Winslade, Ph.D., J.D., Institute for the Medical Humanities, University of Texas Medical Branch, Galveston
John C. Moskop, Ph.D.
TOPICS
Advanced directives
Moral challenges in end of life care
Palliative care, DNR orders
This conference also featured a Readers' Theater performance of Richard Selzer's "A Question of Mercy," and case-oriented small group discussions.
April 21, 1998
Ethical Issues in Organ Transplantation
SPEAKERS
Faculty from East Carolina University School of Medicine and Medical Staff from Pitt County Memorial Hospital.
TOPICS
- Ethical Issues in Organ Transplantation
- Organ Procurement
- Kidney Transplantation
- Blood and Marrow Transplantation
This workshop also included case-oriented small group discussions and a panel discussion.
March 13-14, 1998
20th Anniversary of the Department of Medical Humanities
NOTABLE SPEAKERS:
Margaret Battin, PhD., University of Utah
Tom Beauchamp, Ph.D., Georgetown University
Dan Brock, Ph.D., Brown University
Allen Buchanan, Ph.D., University of Wisconsin
Arthur Caplan, Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania
Larry Churchill, Ph.D., University of North Carolina
H. Tristam Englehardt, Jr., M.D., Ph.D., Baylor College of Medicine and Rice University
Robert Homes, Ph.D., University of Rochester
Laurence McCullough, Ph.D., Baylor College of Medicine
Steven Miles, M.D., University of Minnesota
Kenneth Schaffner, M.D., Ph.D. George Washington University
Stuart Youngner, M.D., Case Western Reserve University
Laurie Zoloth-Dorfman, Ph.D., San Francisco State University
This conference featured a day devoted to debates over physician assisted suicide and another day addressing controversies in bioethics, as well as a Readers' Theater performance of Richard Selzer's "Imelda." It was also the spring meeting of the Society for Health and Human Values.
November 13-14, 1997
Multicultural Issues in Health Care Ethics
The Conference featured a public lecture by Herbert Nickens, M.D., the Vice President for Community and Minority Programs at the Association of American Medical Colleges. Topics addressed in the conference included:
Cultural Challenges in Health Care
The Role of Culture in Health Beliefs, Values, and Practices
Health Care and Culture in Eastern North Carolina
An Ethical Framework for Cross-Cultural Health Care Relationships
The conference also included a readers theater performance of William Carlos Williams' "A Face of Stone," as well as case-oriented small group discussions.
