How to Find Medical Ethics Programs

With the growth of biomedicine, the ability to prolong life, and advances in gene mapping, medical ethics has become a high-profile career field. In fact, all medically related jobs are likely to see excellent growth in the next decade. Not all medical ethicists and bioethicists work in hospitals; some work in government, academia, law, or with social workers and medical professionals. There are few, if any, degrees specifically in medical ethics. The subject is offered as a concentration within a philosophy or theology degree or as part of an interdisciplinary degree.

Instructions

    • 1

      Go to medical school websites to look for medical ethics courses. The top 10 medical schools in the 2010 "U.S. News & World Report" ranking -- Harvard, University of Pennsylvania, Johns Hopkins, the University of California-San Francisco, Washington University, Duke University, University of Michigan-Ann Arbor, the University of Washington, Yale and Columbia -- all offer courses in medical ethics and bioethics as part of the medical doctor degree. Contact the school and ask whether you can audit a course, that is, attend classes for free but receive no credit, or just visit a class once or twice. Then ask how you could incorporate medical ethics into a degree.

    • 2

      Look at colleges and universities that offer both concentrations and degrees in applied ethics, which includes medical ethics. Georgetown University, for example, offers a master's degree in philosophy with a concentration in applied ethics, and a joint degree in law and philosophy at the master's and doctorate levels. Carnegie Mellon University offers an applied ethics concentration, as do Vanderbilt University, Fairfield University in Connecticut, the University of Utah, Oregon State University, and American University in Washington, D.C.

    • 3

      Choose a college with a strong philosophy department. Most accredited four-year colleges and universities offer degrees in philosophy at the bachelor's, master's and doctoral levels, and many of them will allow you to focus your philosophy degree on medical ethics and bioethics.

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