Over the last twenty years, the so-called outcomes movement has come to dominate the health-care industry in all developed and many developing countries. The outcomes movement refers broadly to an approach which focuses on health-care or educational outcomes—outcomes which are measurable endpoints, and which can be evaluated in aggregate, using statistics. The healing process itself is viewed as a black box, containing too many variables for explanation and analysis. What is of interest are measurable inputs and outputs only.
Length: 22:40

Plenary Address from CBHD's 15th Annual Conference: Healthcare and the Common Good.

One Christian-Hippocratic position pertaining to the essentials of ethical medical practice has been unequivocal. There should be total separation between “black and white” medicine as described through the pregnant admonition: “do no harm.” Originally, the “black” side of medicine could be summarized neatly by two activities proscribed within the body of the Hippocratic Oath itself, abortion and euthanasia (or assisted suicide).

The second and final part of a lecture given by Farr Curlin, MD for a Trinity Graduate School colloquium in February 2008. Dr. Curlin is assistant professor of Medicine at the University of Chicago Medical Center. The lecture is entitled, “Getting below the surface: the ethics of religious/spiritual interaction in the clinical encounter.”